Try
by eveelove
Summary: Chelsea is not ordinary. Ask anyone. She's animal obsessed, easily bored, seemingly treats humans as toys, and is generally off the wall crazy. Yet there's more to her than others think, but will she show it?
1. Different world's collide

**A/N **

**Hi! Originally I wasn't sure if I wanted to post this to Fanfiction or not but as the story continued to grow I figured throwing it to the sharks should be fine. I research my stories so anything that seems like it might be true is probably true but at the same time this is a work of fiction so I did take a few Author's liberty's to it. Any part that's italicized is the characters thoughts. I have half of this story already finished and the other half mostly planned out but I wanted to make sure it was as done as I could get it to be without another person. I liked to say from here on out I'll use the top half of the Author's note to explain parts in stories and the bottom half will probably be a 'sorry I took so long reason was...' type thing. I try staying loyal to the character personalities but everyone once in a while my own traits will slip in and I'll go with it, so if you get any moments where you're going WTF? that would probably be the reason why. Anyway, without further ado, here is my Fanfic try.**

* * *

I glared at the cloud.

Ten seconds ago that bi-polar cloud was a bunny, now it was somehow a chicken. Or was it that cloud over there that was the bunny?

'_Screw it, I'm bored. I need something to do or I'll strip a stranger and laugh as they chase me for their clothes back.' I grin, 'that probably would be a lot less amusing than it was in the city.'_

His face was to die for. Totally worth being shipped off on a boat destined to crash. '_after all this place ain't so bad I guess, 'cept for the boredom that comes with having nothing really to do_.'

A knock on my house door knocked me out of my daydream.

"Over here!" I yelled from my perch on the stable roof.

Why am I up here? 'Cause I am a monkey, Ooh Ooh Aah Aah!

Okay that was dumb. What would a monkey do on a roof? No, I'm definitely a talented chicken, like that stubborn shape shifting one in the sky, that's now a Geisha. Stupid cloud.

I looked down to see who it was when I heard a stick crunch ,but I was disappointed to see nothing but roof.

"What are ya doing up there?" A gruff voice called.

"Fighting boredom. Want'a help? 'Cause frankly, I'm losing pretty bad over here." I laugh down.

"Yer stupid." He replied in a southern drawl.

'seems like a nice guy'

Ugh! Now, that I know I can't see him, I want to, like, really, really bad.

" Gee thanks! I know, right?! So whatcha' doing visiting this stupid girl than?" I question inching dangerously closer to the edge.

If this guys interesting enough to amuse me in the first five minutes we meet, I think I should see his face.

"Mirabelle and Julia forced me ta come." He grunted, "Name's Vaughn, I'm the animal dealer for the island" He stated.

After hanging almost completely upside down, I spotted a dark cowboy like guy with silver hair start to leave.

Thrilled that I'd finally managed to spot him, I couldn't allow him to leave. So I jumped off the roof aiming for a black Stetson.

With a dull thud and a loud oomph I knew that my launch was a success.

"YOU INSANE!" he roared, his glare turning the air to an icy breeze.

_'Aww! cute! The toy has my Pit Bull's glare.'_

However, my "family members" glares are worse and I'm usually delighted to get them.

"I'm bored and you were entertaining. No way would I let you leave so soon. After all, I hadn't even gotten to see your face yet! Obviously, Julia didn't brief you at all on what I expect of people before I let them leave. Silly girl." I giggled.

"Tell me then. What do I do ta leave?" He growled.

I made a hmm sound and put my finger to my lip. "I'm not so sure I'll tell ya. After all, you are definitely not being nice." I finished poking him lightly on the nose.

"Then let me leave." He yells.

"No way! I'd rather tell ya. Okay, there's only two things I expect, One is if they want me to talk, I have to be entertained. The other thing I expect is once I'm entertained they can't leave till I get bored of them." I say excited.

"But you know, now that I see ya yer kinda cute, I might let you leave if you promise that you'll come back." I leaned in towards him leaving an inch apart from our faces smirking all the way.

'Finally!' I thought. 'I can properly see his eyes instead of the boring shaded view I was getting that made his eyes look black.'

A violent shade of violet greeted my stare into his eyes. Startling enough to leave a slight thrill of fear down my back yet dazzling enough to force me to drift into a daze.

At this rate he might be able to beat my little sis' in a glare off. Maybe. At least his glare was far more intricate, even going so far as to showing off his intentions. Which evidently is more effective than I thought because I froze up.

Frozen and unsure of what to do now, for once in my life, I didn't have any sort of schemes, plots, or dangerous ideas left.

I had no clue what to do anymore so I just stared dumbstruck, jaw open.

Eventually he threw me off and spit out, "Whatcha' lookin at."

Then he left and I watched him go.

"My name's Chelsea!" I yelled after him stupidly with a small wave.

When he had left I started shaking lightly from all my bunched up expectations that came upon me. He was interesting, very interesting. And he was cute to boot. Being shipwrecked here might possibly work out as the best thing ever.

Suddenly I felt that I needed something to do.

I looked to the field, '_maybe clearing those weeds would be a good idea now?_'

I set to work, humming, thinking of future fun.

* * *

** Vaughn**

* * *

I walked into the animal shop fuming.

Who the heck was that insane girl? Oh yeah, the stupid shitty rancher that if my luck is low, I'll have to do business with.

"SHE NEARLY BROKE MY FRICKIN' NECK FROM THAT JUMP! I'LL KILL HER!" I bellowed entering the kitchen where Julia makes her poisons she calls food, and Mirabelle makes actual, very much good, meals.

"Hey Vaughnie boy. I guess you met Chels?" Julia giggled.

I glare cold and hard finding my rage lashing out towards Julia as well.

She flinches.

" Hey what's up with that? I didn't do anything to ya!" She squeaks.

" No, but you sent me to a rancher who thought jumping on top of someone off of a stable roof was okay." I spit.

Julia's jaw dropped, then she somehow saw fit to burst into a riot of laughter.

I glared at her.

" Chelsea would go so far to entertain herself that she'd jump off a roof onto a cactus of a cowboy like you!? I knew she could go far, but not that far! That's a freakin riot!" She squealed tears coming to her eyes.

"Shut up." I warned.

Julia stopped laughing but any fool could tell, she was trying very hard to restrain herself, even having tears run down her face from the effort.

I glared her down then left to my room feeling beaten.

The second my door closed I could hear her let out every last laugh she was holding in.

I thought of the ranchers face when she looked at me. Same as all the stupid one's. I punched the wall and growled.

That stupid rancher. I'm tying her up next time I see her.


	2. Gabe

**A/n Okay so this chapter is not my best work. Just saying. Also like to notify you that not every chapter is only going to be in Vaughn and Chelsea's pov alternatively. Its just worked out that way so far. I tried my best to make this chapter semi presentable, though I still hate it, so enjoy.**

* * *

I looked out the window in hope. That hope was crushed. Shit, I'm early again just like I thought. The sun is SO not even up yet.

I sigh at the clock as it flashed off a bright green 4:00.

What's up with my body? It gets two hours of sleep then forces me to wake up two hours before the freakin sun, ain't normal.

I sighed again, if I just stay in bed hoping for a more acceptable time to wake up, I'll either achieve my goal and fall asleep again, or I'll do the unacceptable and I'll bore myself.

Really though there was nothing to think about.

Grumbling the whole time. I slipped on my yellow shirt, my orange vest, my blue shorts, and my red boots.

I glimpsed at my red bandana, and was reminded of a furry little critter with an identical one. A slight depression washed over me, '_I hope my dog Gabe is okay'._ I grabbed it and tied it onto my head to cover my hair, feeling a bit better. Then turning to leave, I grabbed a hammer, an axe, a watering can and set to work.

By the time my work was finished, all the plants had been watered and I only felt half drained. I went inside to check the time and was disappointed. A red 8:00 flashed on my bedside clock..

"Damn ,it's only been 4 hours! What am I going to do now?", I yelled at no one.

Calmly cursing myself with every swear word I knew, I than a made up few. I also cursed out my weird body that does stupid stuff like rushing and waking up at 4am, than I did it again in every language I knew. Only passed about two minutes doing it. I checked.

I racked my brain for something to do, than I duly remember that there were things I could sell around the island. Maybe that could eat up the rest of my time.

I grabbed the mysterious rucksack that seemed as if it could never be full, put it on my back, and left my house. When I opened the door, I was startled to see a person in front of me, about to knock on my face.

"Oh, sorry." She giggled.

I raised an eyebrow at a tan, very happy Julia.

"What are you doing here?" I asked, curious.

"Just poking my nose around, sniffing for rumors."

"And?"

"You and Vaughn are the center of the biggest ones! What's this I hear about you tackling him to the ground?" She asked her eyes alight.

I shrug and respond with an. "I was bored."

"and that was the only reason?" She asked,curiosity surrounding her.

"And I wanted to see his face."

"And?"

"His eyes are awesome, his hair is cool, and that outfit of his definitely perks my interest. Oh yeah, I've also decided to make him another of my toys so your load is now lightened. Done yet?" I ask.

I became slightly annoyed, by the sight that for some reason, Julia was taking notes.

Very actively.

With a somehow scary grin on her face.

She looked up from the notepad, "Uh huh, yeah. So where ya off to?"

I sighed, frustrated, "Julia, Julia, Julia, you're boring and irritating me."

She moved out of my way, allowing me to pass by.

I smiled, "Much better."

Then I started walking. Julia, attempting to keep pace behind me was stretching her legs far as they could go. Taking pity, I slowed down enough for it not to be obvious but enough for her not to have done a half trot behind me. She caught up and was huffing.

I raised my eyebrow. She glared in response.

"Okay, so I don't exercise much."

"Jules, no offense, but honestly, I'd think you'd die if you had to do any form of manual labor." I teased.

"Chels no offense, but if you're trying to pass time, going that fast won't help." She backfired.

I blushed. Screw the world, that damn girl is right.

Spinning on my heels, I rushed to the nearest herb leaving Jules far behind and never allowing her to catch up._ 'Herbs are sellable, right? Of course they are. Shit. Quit holding conversations in your head, you're crazy enough, don't make yourself go insane.'_

After a bit I heard a noise very appealing to me. The sound of a chicken cluck.

I followed the sound trying not to get up any hopes. Crushed hopes suck. Never worth it. Even if your boredom is cured.

Slowing down as my target came into sight, I cautiously worked my way into the pen behind Mirabelle's shop.

I squealed.

A pen full of chickens.

I crouched down and was very happily swarmed.

A few daring ones would even attempt to hop atop my head or shoulders. I loved it.

In a riot of delighted giggles I just sat there allowing the chickens to settle themselves.

" All better guys?" I cooed after most of them were minding their own business.

A chick walked up to me and lied on my lap in response.

Surprised, I just sat there for a sec. Then slowly, almost mechanically I began to stroke the soft chick. A smile worked itself upon my face and refused to leave, not that I really wanted it to, and slowly I, and the chick, both drifted off into a very light, calm sleep.

** Vaughn**

I walked into the chicken coop careful not to drop the load of feed I was holding. I sat it down in its usual spot and turned around.

Shock grabbed me at the sight of a chestnut haired girl with a red bandana sleeping in the corner with a yellow chick on her lap. On closer inspection, I realized it was the rancher.

'_She looks very different when sleeping, way more peaceful.'_ I thought mildly. For a few seconds I stared at her and her sleeping face. Then I remembered, this was NOT her barn. A cool rage brewed itself in my stomach, I tapped her with my foot and hissed, "get up"

She stirred a bit but still no other reaction occurred.

"HEY!" I yelled, "WAKE UP!"

She jumped waking the chick up. He chirped in distress. A slight twinge of guilt spread through at that but I didn't let it touch my rage.

"Wai, wha, huh, waz happning." She mumbled disoriented.

"You fell asleep in our coop that's what's happening." I growled.

She looked around confused and just mumbled, "coop? coop ? coop?", it reminded me slightly of an owl going 'who?who?who?'

_ 'that's kinda cute'_

I jumped at the thought. Damn it. I did not just think that.

Then she yelled in realization snapping me out of my-whatever., "OH YEAH! COOP! CHICKENS!" Somehow her face lite up and she grinned, ear to ear, as she watched the chickens scrambling all together to get their food.

Stunned that she could smile normally, I sat there watching her.

It's good that she's actually an animal lover. After all, there's no way I'm selling any animals to anyone who won't care either way about their well-being. My anger faded slightly

I watched as some of the chickens finished their meals and started swarming her.

She laughed.

As each one came to her she'd pick it up and coo to something to them.

Each time she sat a chicken down it would stay at that spot than try to get closer when she set another one down.

'_Seems that animals like her too'_ I thought lucidly.

"Animals are amazing aren't they?" She said blissfully.

I grunted in response.

"I mean they know a humans distresses better than anyone and almost seem to know exactly what to do to save them from themselves...if you give them a chance that is."

We sat like that in a somewhat comfortable silence. Then she looked at me again and a small piece of what I saw yesterday was back on her face.

"So cowboy, whatcha gonna do?" She asked.

I looked at her in puzzlement.

" You woke me up forcibly. Something not even my parents willingly do unless their ticked,I might add. So whatcha need?"

I stared at her then it snapped into place.

"What are you doing in Mirabelle's coop?" I growled. She shrugged her shoulders as if it didn't matter either way.

"I was bored and heard clucking. So I followed it."

I narrowed my eyes "So you crawled over a gate to follow it?"

She stared at me with empty eyes that said she thought I was stupid. Which didn't really make sense. Must of showed, because something seemed to click and she rushed out of the coop.

"HEY! Where do you think yer going!" I roared.

"Shut up! I'm doing a favor!" She yelled back.

I chased after her confused and yelled again, "Just what sorta favor could you possibly be doing!?"

She ignored my frustrated roar and ran to the gate. She stopped at a nearby spot in the gate and started digging through her rucksack. I watched, too exhausted from the run to talk(I wasn't out of shape,she was just faster than what you'd generally think) as she pulled out some wood, chicken wire, nails, and a hammer.

"What are you doin?" I asked still exhausted.

"The fence has a hole, that's how I got in, just give me a sec."

She clipped, wrapped, stapled and hammered in a seemingly random fashion for a time then she turned to me and smiled. "Finished."

I chanced a glimpse at the fence. She repaired it so nothing bigger than an ant could get through. Although it looked very crude you could tell it now would be the hardest spot to squeeze through for anything that would want to.

"You do carpentry?" I asked.

She looked up at me after evaluating her work. " No, I'm not anything as interesting as a carpenter, but back home, if I wanted any pets, ALL care and welfare would be left to me. Which means shelter, food, vet expenses, water, attention, it was all left to my responsibility."

I glanced at her, "All their care? How old are you? At best you look like you just turned 18. Your parents didn't take care of the expenses or take over when you went to school? Things like that?" I questioned.

She stood up, brushed off dirt from her Capri's and responded, "well ,cowboy I'm actually 22, and my parents and I, we didn't have the best of understandings, especially when it came to my animals. Which by the way they hated. I just got up a bit earlier in the mornings than other people and took care of them."

"Early?"

"About 2 am every morning to take care of my dogs. Dink, Max, and Gabe. My multitude of cats, a donkey named Trix, the goats and sheep. Cows, chickens, and a horse named Trot. All of which were rescues that I would find in random places. Any money I got from part times went to them."

I stared at the girl before me. I admit, though I still hate her guts, she has gained a bit of my respect.

"So what happened to them? If your parents didn't care about them, where are they now?" I asked gruffly.

"I gave all the farm animals to a few honest farmers I knew very well, my cat's I gave to some trustworthy people who worked at my part-time, Dink went to a nice family with 3 kids, I got my cousin to take Max. And Gabe?" She stopped and her voice caught and her eyes misted over when she said. "He was with me on the ship but it sank and…I'm just hoping he's okay."

I stared at this girl who was about to cry for a dog.

"I'm sure your dog will turn up somewhere." I said surprising myself.

"And why would that be?" I took me about two second to answer.

"Because if someone like you can survive a boat wreck, a dog with natural survival instincts should be fine"

She nodded her head, "and if I just got lucky?"

"Than he should to."

She nodded her head at that, hopped the fence and turning to me and quickly gave me an awkward goodbye.

_'What the heck was that?'_ Completely unsure if I just held a civilized normal conversation with someone…like her, let alone comforted someone.


	3. like the moon

My eyes burned, thanks to Vaughn though, they were still dry.

Dragging my feet, I made my way to a carpenter's house. I opened the door and shut it behind me.

" Chels you okay?" The big burly mountain of a man named Gannon asked behind his wooden desk.

" I just came to ask for a chicken coop." Taking the hint of the avoided topic, he followed my lead.

"You finally have enough money? Good, I was starting to feel guilty not building you one. "

"And I would have felt guilty if you did, so this works out the best for us both, doesn't it?" I said with my trademark tigress grin.

_ 'Ha! Gannon, Mirabelle and Taro are the only people who cheer me up that fast and they probably don't even know they're doing it!_' I thought.

I handed him the money and he gave a big toothy grin "It'll be done by tomorrow. I'll head over immediately after you leave"

"Great, can't wait. See ya Gannon!" I yell waving behind me.

"See ya Chels! Stay chirpy" He yells back gathering up some tools. I laughed at that as the door shuts behind me and makes an audible click.

I trot off the steps, excited.

Unfortunately due to my excitement I had forgotten that foraging was a boredom keep-away and finished picking all I could in thirty minutes.

I looked around and saw nothing but trimmed grass

"Crraaaappppppp," I hissed through my teeth, "now what the hell will I do?"

"Well, you could build a chicken fence in preparation for your chickens"

I swung around and nearly tackled an old man half my size in blue overalls who was standing behind me.

"Taro!You scared me!"

"Hello Chelsea, old knees telling me it'll be cloudy tomorrow. Gannon's says you'll have a barn as well" He replied.

"Hehe, really, I've always liked the cloudy days the best." I smile down at him."Tomorrow's the turnips harvest day right?"

He hesitated, stopped, thought it over then replied. "Should be just about. A week from now yer potato's should be done growing as well."

"Great! Once the turnips are harvested, I'll have a large enough area to build a grazing fence and won't have to force my poor animals to stay in on a good day."

Taro laughed a bit at my eagerness.

" You're really looking forward to those animals of yours. I gotta get movin now though. Else who knows the mayhem Natalie and Elliot will cause in the shipping area. Keep up the Good work Chelsea"

"Bye Taro!" I said as I waved him off in the direction of the beach.

I saw him make a slight wave behind him and then the sand hill entrance of the beach blocked his form from sight.

I sighed, _'now what do I do?'_

I racked my brain to come up with a solution to my dilemma.

I've watered the crops, smashed the stones and twigs, pulled the weeds, can't yet harvest anything, no animals, everyone's busy, clouds are bipolar, I hate fishing, not enough ingredients to cook anything time-consuming. I've harassed Vaughn already, shipped the herbs, there's no hot springs, and the last time I went mining Taro almost took away my stuff because I fell down a hole…

"_I can go for a swim…_" I thought mindlessly.

I turned around, looked at the beach, saw Denny's boat, which looms over it and responded to that out loud with "or I could beg someone to drown me again."

Mindlessly I walked towards the bridge to the forest, walked through it, climbed the mountain and eventually I reached the mountain peak.

I sat and stared over the island.

'_I must have some type of addiction to high places'_ I thought just before I stopped thinking and just stared out over the modest island that was my home.

You could see everything up here. Mirabelle's red barn with the chicken coop out in the way back, Taro and the fam's house, Chen and Charlie's shop, Gannon's carpentry shop, the inn, the forest below the mountain, the beach and Denny's house, the meadow, the forest where Shea and his old man live, the café and dinner, the hotel, Sabrina and her dad's mansion, Lanna and her monstrosity of a house which is completely pink, the witch's house I haven't seen due to a poor sense of direction, the harvest goddess church and pond which I also haven't seen, Pierre's house and last of all my place.

'Hopefully this is my permanent home. No more running off.'

I decided to be patient as the moon that waited for the sun to reveal it.

* * *

**Vaughn**

* * *

I stomped through the mountain path. I couldn't believe how much I was looking for a dog that could be dead.

_'At the same time you never know, and it'd be better to find him sooner than later if he is alive.'_

As I reached the peak I recognized someone sitting there. Seeing the bright red bandana she's had on every time I've seen her I recognized her immediately.

I felt like calling out to her about being out so late but something in me told me to wait.

I studied her face that was calm but at the same time had a hint of sadness. She was looking over the island and her eyes stopped on her farm. They rested there for a long time, then she sighed and looked up towards the sky. Somehow I was almost desperate to know what was running through her mind, like it would matter in the somewhat distant future. When the sun was almost completely set she made like she was going to get up.

"Hey." I grunted, breaking the thin glass of silence

She turned around slightly startled. Then a somewhat devilish smirk that I'm also seeing as normal , popped up.

"Hey cowboy." She said standing up putting her rucksack on at the same time.

"You leavin?" I asked.

She snorted, "As much as I love animals, I'd still love just as much to not come across any wild ones I could come across at night."

I grunted in agreement.

" So why you up here?" She asked.

"No real reason." I said turning my head away and pulling down my Stetson a bit. Most likely if I told her she'd think it was for her. And that wasn't it. I just cared about the dog's well-being. Right?

She laughed out a, "Sure, whatever." ,Then left down the mountain.

I watched her go.

Once she faded out of my sight I looked up at the sky. The stars were starting to come out. The moon was already shining, lighting up the island so everything was still visible. The island seemed to be shimmering with its glow. After what seemed like eternity I looked at my watch.

12 am. Time to go catch a boat.

* * *

** Chelsea**

* * *

_'So, cowboy can lie huh?_' My heart squeezed but I shook it off._ 'Whatever, it's not like I'm not used to it.'_

I kept my eyes locked on my feet, not feeling any real urge to look up.

I kicked a rock, and that's when I heard it. A growl that spurred on a fearful shiver. I looked up and not even two feet from where I kicked the rock stood a mangy wild dog. I looked around me for anything I could use to make it go away, a long stick, a heavy rock, but there was nothing. I started backing up trying to get away from it, but for every step back I took, it took a step towards me. A sudden memory of a hiking trip from when I was five popped into my head.

_"Ne,né, what do we do if we're attacked by wolves?" I asked the adults randomly._

_ They turned to me._

_ "Why do you want to know that?" My Uncle asked._

_ "It's seems important."_

_ The group let out a riot of laughter._

_ "I don't know 'bout you guys but I'd run!" My cousin Jeff said._

_ "I'd climb the nearest tree!" My Dad's friend, John piped in._

_ Suddenly a bunch of answers ran through the crowd._

_ "Kick it!" "Swim!" "Scream!" "Pray!" "Bust it with a club!"_

_ Eventually my mom joined in and the group went quite, "You guys are foolish! Quit filling her head with bull!" _

_ Then she turned to me and said, " Listen if you come across a wolf don't run. Don't show fear. Make yourself intimidating but don't make it seem like you're challenging them. Also, remember, don't make direct eye contact, and if the wolf starts trying to come closer discard not being intimidating because that wolf is too curious. So make noise, lots of it. Do this and most likely the wolf will leave you be."_

I zoned back into my present situation and saw the dog had crept forward a few more inches.

"I hope this works with dogs..." I said under my breath.

I straightened my back, avoided the dogs eyes but made sure to watch him from the corner of mine.

He made another step forward, slightly unsure of himself. I drew myself up, took a deep breath and yelled, waving my arms, "Get out of here! Shoo! Go!"

He ran. I let out a sigh of relief and collapsed on the ground.

The eerie quiet of the woods made my breathing seem even louder and heavier than normal, then, slowly, the noise picked up returning to the audio of a night woods.

"Shit, that was kinda scary." I said with a soft sigh of breath that seemed like a roar.

I started laughing manically. "What the hell! I thought I was going to die!"

I laughed and laughed and laughed until my ribs ached and all the tension left.

"To think my mom's advice would follow me here." I said looking into the sky at the irony, a grin tugging my lips.

I got up and was covered in the forest's rich soil.

I laughed some more. "I'm willing to bet its tangled in my hair."

With that I finished my night and headed home.

* * *

**A/n**

**Evidently, I can currently write nothing but crap. Too bad because the later chapter are a bit better. I could have made this chapter shorter but felt a need to prove a point. **


	4. He's alive

Bored…..

My work for the day was already finished and evidently Vaughn wasn't staying at the island 24/7.

To make it worse, Mirabelle had a family issue she had to settle and I couldn't get the chickens for my coop.

I sighed. Of course somehow I managed to find myself back on my stable roof like it's some kinda frickin boredom magnet.

"Chelsea!" I looked down at a bobbing pink head.

Slipping half off and holding on tight to the roof I dangled upside down just in front of her.

" What's up Nat?"

She yelped and flung up a bag.

I flinched as what I assumed would have been my groceries splattered over onto the stable walls.

"What the hell Natalie!" I yelled.

" Whose fault do you think that is!"

I glared and she shirked back.

" Anyway, why are you up on the stable roof again?" She asked annoyance tingeing her voice.

"I'm bored."

"Anything new?" She snidely replied.

I sighed and jumped down.

Sticking the landing I stood up straight and brushed off the dirt that flared up onto my caprice on the impact.

"You're a real damn ball of sunshine ain't you?" I snapped.

She rolled her eyes.

" You know they say smoke and idiots like high places."

"Then I must be smoke 'cause I sure as hell ain't no idiot compared to someone who just splashed milk and eggs onto a stable wall."

We stared each other down than cracked up like two fools.

"So I hear you met Julia's cousin? How'd it go?" She said. Visually becoming smaller as she settled down.

" Oh you know, I stripped him stark naked and threw his clothes into the river."

" YOU DID NOT!" She yelled taken back.

" No dip, dipshit ."

She slapped me on the arm in reply. It stung. Bad.

I grabbed my arm.

"Ow! Easy. I need these to work!"

She pinched up her nose," Then don't scare me like that! I thought one of you two would turn up face down in the ocean, because you did something stupid," she pitched up her voice her making an irritating imitation of me. "in a quest to cure boredom, again!"

I snickered " I wouldn't do something like that…"

Monotonously she answered, " You striped a man in the city. Don't think I would have forgotten a story like that."

I cringed. She threw me in the river in her shock at that one

. "Okay, Okay, so I wouldn't do that to somebody who had spurs on their boots, and looked like a person who would be carrying a pocket knife for just in case purposes."

" Speaking of which don't you still do that?" She asked.

I shrugged " Hey, trade of a southern city slicker."

"Whatever, so how'd your meeting really go?" She asked.

" I tackled him from the roof of this stable."

"Chelsea! Seriously! Quite joking!" She sighed.

" Actually, I'm serious."

Her eyes bulged out her reply before she said it. " CHELSEA! WHY?!"

I did that I don't know shrug that everyone I'm sure is very familiar with and also at one point been very irritated with. This was Natalie's irritated moment. "Seriously! Why?" She said frustrated.

"I couldn't see his face." I sniffed out.

"So you tackle him? From a roof? Are you a steroid induced football player or something?"

I chuckled.

She grew red in rage, it looked weird with her pink hair, "Chelsea!"

"Okay, okay. Sorry. I won't ever do it again. To anyone"

She cooled it a little.

"Promise?"

I crossed my fingers behind my back, "Promise."

She sighed, "Whatever, I have to go back to get you more groceries. Comin' with?"

I glomped onto her, " Yes! Yes! A thousand times yes! I've been staring at clouds for an hour!"

She pushed me off, "What the hell were you thinking? Why didn't you just bother someone like you always do?"

I shrugged, "People were busy."

She heaved out a sigh.

"You could have helped someone out."

"They weren't that busy."

Shaking her head she turned around and started walking, "you coming or what?"

I followed her.

"So if aliens decided to abduct you what would you do?" I asked as we walked.

"I'd ask if they knew you. Seriously where do you get those stupid questions from?"

"The Harvest Goddess sends them to me saying 'you must ask these questions or else they will really happen and that person will be unprepared.'"

Natalie glared at me, "Are you high?"

I laughed, "Is that a suggestion?"

She slapped me on the arm again, "Do it and I drop a box of your groceries on your head."

I laughed rubbing my arm, "it's a joke! Don't kill me, the island needs me!"

"I'll be glad to take over in that case" She smirked playfully.

I put my hand over my mouth and widened my eyes dramatically, " Don't kill me, I'm too young, please!"

We laughed.

Taro grunted his disapproval as I nearly ran over him in our joking nature.

We flinched. Dude, we need to make him wear a bell.

" Chelsea it's good to see you. Natalie you have the rest of the day off so why are you down here?" Taro asked.

I reacted with the only way I knew how at the time, the only way I could come up with in my boredom induced stupidity. The only smart and logical thing I could come up with at the time.

I pointed and threw someone under the bus.

"Natalie threw my groceries at my stable wall."

Okay, I know. But I never said it was the most mature thing did I?

Natalie glared at me, Taro glared at Natalie, I had my hands behind my back trying not to whistle suspiciously.

"Natalie." Taro chided.

"She scared the crap out of me by hanging upside down!" She defended.

"Again?" I flinched at the oncoming lecture I knew so well to be coming, "You need to stop doing such reckless things, you're our rancher and the island needs you. What do you think would happen if you were injured because you fell off the roof?"

Okay, this may or may not been at least the fourth time this has happened, but still…

"Do you understand?" In a bobble doll-like fashion, I nodded my head eagerly up and down in reply.

He sighed, "Good, now would you like to grab your groceries for this month? I'm sure there would be more than enough produce for you."

I grinned, he grinned, we all grinned.

Well actually, not really. Technically, I grinned , Taro smiled, and Natalie just looked relieved she wasn't in trouble. Details.

"So what's the news on your chickens?" Taro queried. I heaved out a heavy sigh and looked at him in puppy dog eyes, "You mean the non-existent ones I want so bad?"

He looked at me in pity filled eyes, "Why? What's wrong?"

I shook my head lightly, "Mirabelle had a family emergency and couldn't be on the island long enough to pass off the chickens and their care items. Julia had to go with her to. The note on their door said they shouldn't be back for at least a week. Something about a second cousins baby. Nothing serious" Taro patted me on the back.

"Cheer up. You'll be a lot more excited when they do arrive if you wait a bit in the first place."

I looked at him, "Taro I've never gone a month without any pets before all this. Half the year's gone by and I don't even have a mouse on the farm to change that."

Natalie shrugged, "If you wanted mice than you shouldn't be so clean, your house would be flocked with them if you had it as messy as Denny's"

"Hey now! That was uncalled for!" Denny cried out coming up to us with two fishing rods and a bucket full of fish.

I smiled. "Good day?"

He turned to me, a huge smile plastered on his face. "The best this season! Maybe even this year!" He did a light fist pump at that.

"Have any live unwanted catch I could keep?" I asked.

He screwed up his eyebrows at me confused, "Unwanted catch?"

"You know, frogs or turtles? Things of that like."

He became even more confused at this and turned to Taro and Natalie , eyes questioning. Natalie stepped forward. "She's having animal withdrawal symptoms."

"That bad huh?" He said.

I groaned, "I think druggies have it easier."

He laughed, "Unless you start getting jittery and having strokes, that's not likely. Tell you what, I caught a black rat snake and a box turtle in the fish net, and I saw a bull frog under the dock. You can have the snake and turtle and if that's not satisfying enough for now, I'll help you find the croaker."

I hugged him. "Thank you! I'll take the snake and turtle, frogs are heavy eaters and need lots of space so I'll just leave him be." He nodded his head and set his bucket down.

"How big is the snake?" Taro asked. Denny thought about it. "About two feet long, they're constrictors so no venom."

Taro turned to me, one eyebrow raised, " You'll keep a snake where farm birds are kept?" I gave him a reassuring smile, "Don't worry about it. Rat snakes won't try eating anything bigger than a finch unless they're incredibly hungry, he'll be kept in an appropriate cage in my house, they're not known to pass on diseases, all snakes are sanitary animals, and I know how to predator proof cages, fences, and barns."

He closed his eyes and nodded understanding, "and how will you feed them? No one around here is willing to open a reptile and amphibian pet store." I smiled, "I'll catch fish now and then for the turtle and get mice, bugs and rats from Denny's house. Not like he'll notice with the amount in there."

"Hey!"He yelled.

Natalie and I laughed. He pouted, "See if I'll do nice things for you again." His parrot squawked agreeance.

We talked a little more until I started getting bored. So I went back to my farm to figure out the next thing I could do.

In the end I just watched clouds till I could go to bed.

As I laid down in my bed to get to sleep, I heard a familiar howl I never expected to hear again.

My dogs alive and well, and he's on this island.

I went to bed with a big grin that night.


	5. Family

**A/N So pretty much this whole chapter is probably one of the shortest chapters I'm going to have, probably. Mark is probably going to be similar to an information broker in this story. Not in the 'hey money for info' but he'll provide a lot of info backing. Anything he doesn't say you're going to have to figure it out yourself. Or through Vaughn. Maybe. I don't really like how Mark talks though. He's kinda wordy. Too bad he's an important character. I like Cliff though, so you'll definitely see him again. Don't know how or when, but you will. ANNNDDD I'm rambling, sorry, Chelsea and Mark's been rubbing off on me I guess. So, enjoy, what? the fourth chapter? Fifth? Math sucks. Enjoy the chapter "Family".  
**

* * *

Vaughn

* * *

"So Vaughn, how's the new island placement working out for you?" Cliff asked.

I growled at him to shut up.

"That bad,? What happened?" Cliff asked.

I rolled my eyes, "The farmers an idiot."

I dropped my tool box and leather drawstring bag down by my desk. The tool box is for work purposes while the bag is pretty much my suitcase. I hadn't yet gone to my apartment, so it was still on me.

"How bad could he be?" Cliff asked.

I huffed, "First it's a she, not a he, which is fine. What wasn't fine was the fool pretty much launched herself off a stable roof and tackled me to the ground."

Cliff stared at me, stunned silent, "you didn't kill her did you?"

I leaned against the wall and crossed my arms and legs and shook my head at Cliff.

"Did she quit?" I narrowed my eyes to show annoyance.

Cliff shook his head, as if attempting to shake his thoughts into order. "Well, why did she do it?"

I scowled at particularly no one. "Apparently, she was bored." I said, spitting out the words.

His eyes bulged. "Just for that reason? Nothing else? I hope she learned her lesson after that then."

I fixed my black Stetson. " If only, she seemed thick skulled." 'Literally' I mentally added as the memory of us first meeting popped up again.

"Glad I'm not you than." Cliff finished with an irksome smirk. I pulled at my Stetson in irritation.

"The girl who was bored. Was her hair brown, a little past the shoulders, and straight? And did she have blue eyes and wear a reddish bandana often?" A blonde person with a blue hat, green eyes and a bandana around his neck very similar to Chelsea's in all ways except color, asked as he came in.

"know her?" Cliff asks.

"maybe, what was her name again?" He asked, strangely excited.

"We never said it." I replied harshly.

"Her name's Chelsea." Cliff said looking into my shipment placement order.

I glared at him. " Don't pretend you would have answered the man if I hadn't looked and told him."

I rolled my eyes, the blonde teen looking kid ran to Cliff, "Where is she at?" He asked looking like the kid on Christmas who got all the gifts he wanted and more and Cliff was the one who gave them to him.

"Why are you asking?" Cliff asked furrowing his brow.

The Blonde kid laughs. "She's my cousin who I thought was dead. That's why."

"What?" Cliff asked confused. I turned to him and gave him a curt answer, "shipwrecked." His eyes bulge a bit at the realization.

"She's at Sunshine Islands." Cliff hastily answered him.

He smiled, "Right, Sunshine Islands…" He furrowed his brow at a problem that appeared to occur to him. "wait, where is that?" He looked at me, seeing no response, he turned to Cliff who shrugged.

I sighed, "Are you the cousin that took her dog?"

His face lit up like a red tomato. "I didn't take him! What, did she tell you I took him? Does she want him back? I thought that when she gave him to me I could keep him, I got so many things for him. I don't really want to give him back. But if she asked for him back I guess I'll have to give him to her, right? But-"

"Shut up. You're annoying" I growled massaging my temples. Cliff snickered at his desk.

"Sorry, but I just got so attached to him. Well, not at first. At first he ripped up my rug, peed on my sofa, chewed my shoes… But I couldn't hate him for it for some reason and it was great to come home to someone instead of an empty apartment you know? So I bought him chew toys, walked him more often and now he's the best behaved dog ever. I owe Chelsea one for giving him to me, but if she wanted him back..."

I glared at him, "Do you understand shut up?"

He laughed, "That's a pretty good glare you got there. Did Chelsea teach you?"

Cliff snorted on the coffee he was drinking, I just got pissed, "Go to hell."

He raised his eyebrow to that, "Been there, didn't like it. Too much self-pity and wallowing in sorrow. Nope, I'd rather plant my feet to sanity."

Cliff rolled his eyes, "then you should do that soon, idiot." he mumbled under his breath behind a napkin he was using to wipe off the coffee. It was barely loud enough for even me to hear.

He's definitely Chelsea's cousin, they same amazing ability to quickly irritate people.

"So, I know how Chelsea is. How's her dog Gabe?"

The question knocked me off-balance. "Why's it matter?" I ask, wary.

He fixed his hat and looked me in the eye. "Because that is the only critter that's seen the worse of Chelsea and manages to pull her through it. If he's not fine, neither is Chelsea. No matter how much she would or could fake it."

The response so similar to something Chelsea said convinced me. I turned around and grabbed my bag and headed to the door. "Vaughn?" Cliff questions. I continue walking towards the door and pull down my Stetson. "Hey what's your name kid?"

"Mark." Uncertainty showing on his face.

"Well Mark, a boat for Sunshine Islands leaves on Sunday. If you want to see Chelsea you should probably go then." With that I slam the door and got to work.

* * *

**A/n Okay you know that thing where I said this might be just like an excuse part? Scrap it. I'll say occasionally important things every now and then. One of them being _Try'_s update times. Unless my schedule gets screwed up and I upload a chapter the next day, upload days will be on Saturday, unless incident like before happens, in which case it'll be every seven days. I garruntee there will be no set time though, so don't go checking the clock thinking 'five more minutes and there'll be an upload. I'm not that consistent. Also, while I'm at this whole thing, I'd like to thank a person who for now won't be named in case he or she doesn't want to be named and Karisma Jestler for being the first two following my story. It made me happy considering I kept seeing views but no favorites/follows.(I can't remember if I've said this but this is my first Fanfiction and I'm usually shy. Nerves were everywhere.) So thanks! Also, the reason I named Karisma Jestler but not the other person is because they also reviewed. It might have been one word but it was a review and a short compliment. So thanks for taking the time! Anyway, I'm happy with how quickly I could get views and for the most part didn't lose many viewers from chapter to chapter(though somehow a lot of you are skipping chapters 2-3. So I guess a lot of people agree that those two aren't really that good. I also get a lot of visitors so here's your guys shout out! Thanks! Um... I think that's about all I have to say, oh yeah! If you guys have any suggestions or ideas I am open to considering them, I might not take all of them because they wouldn't fit into the ideas I've already planned out in the whole of the story but I still love to hear them! Plus if they're really good I might just put it in a different story. Yes, I do plan to right another VaughnxChelsea fanfic. Next one is going to be WAAYY different from this one so I'm kinda looking forward to it. So...yeah! Don't be shy to review, even if it's a little constructive criticism, I appreciate it all. Oh and this chapter was posted a day early because tomorrow I plan to do nothing but sleep and might not get to a computer so I just posted this latish. Anyway thanks! **


	6. An unexpected morning

**A/n**

**Okay, I'm going to apologize now, it's a cliff hanger. I figured what I had as one chapter was better suited to be divided up and put into two chapters, so that's what I did. I find that you would probably agree as well had you been the one editing it at the time. Yeah, I'm a bit of a perfectionist...Anyway, enjoy the chapter! **

* * *

Chelsea

I paced the beach eyes sharp for any valuable things that might be there. Of course, that was just to pass the time. What I was really waiting for was a boat that had my future chicken on it.

"Are you trying to create a moat lady?"

I smiled down at Charlie. "Good to see you too kiddo." I looked up when I heard the crack of a towel in the air. I smiled at Chen who was resting his beach towel on the sand. "Day off?"

He looked at me grinning and winked. "Oh yeah."

I giggled. Chen seemed to like his job, but he made it obvious, he liked his days off more. A small pull on my shirt put my attention back to Charlie. "Wanta make sand castles lady?"

I looked out at the ocean then down at Charlie than at the sand. "Umm… sure. Why not? I've got more time than anything else right now." I looked up at the clouds and was struck with inspiration. " Let's make a traditional Japanese castle, rivers and elegance included."

Charlie knitted his brows, "How could we possibly do that?" he asked.

I winked at him, "Lots of time, lots of patience."

He smiled, "How much patience?"

I grinned at him, "Do I get bored easily?" He nodded in response. "Then not that much." He laughs.

I started rummaging in my rucksack to look for things I could use. I pulled out a rather large old can I've meant to toss somewhere that has both the lids popped off, my watering can, a random straw I didn't know was in there, and a butter knife I took from my kitchen for lunch. Charlie stared at each item in badly masked curiosity.

I looked at him, "Ready to begin?" He nodded enthusiastically. " Okay, so, what we need to do first is to put a bit of sand in the can. Maybe about an inch?" He went to work, scooping up handfuls of sand and placing it softly into the can. "Alright, and I now I'll add some water to give it stickiness."

He laughed. "Stickiness?"

I pouted, "Hey, no one ever said my vocabulary was going to win me any rewards."

"Got that right."

I rolled my eyes. "Alright, then brat, you wanna learn how to make a Japanese castle or do you want to make wise cracks at me?"

He laughed."Teasing you sounds fun."

And then we went into one of our usual routines.

"Does not!."

"Does to!"

"Brat!"

"Snob!"

"Jerk!"

"fatuous freak!"

"What does that mean and where the heck did you learn it!"

Charlie stuck his tongue out me. "Shows how smart you are lady."

My right eye twitched. "I'm going to get you, you twerp!"

He started backing up, "You'll have to catch me first." he yelled.

Then he ran. "Oh no you don't!"

I chased him around the rock that collects seaweed in the spring. Somehow we just wound up doing that same circling thing that keeps either person from making any real progress.

Annoyed I climbed up the rock. Charlie stared up at me eyes wide. I smirked down at him. Realizing what I was about to do he tried to run away from the rock. He was too late. With a huge leap I tackled Charlie to the ground, wrapping my arms tight around him so the impact wouldn't do any serious damage.

I locked his head between the crook of my elbow and pinned him to the ground. "Nowhere to run now!" I screamed jokingly. Then I gave him a good firm noogie.

"Call uncle!" I laughed. He bit down on his tongue in refusal, so I applied more pressure.

"Okay, okay! Uncle!" He caved in giggles.

"Ha! I Win!" I exclaimed, raising my arms in triumph.

" You still don't know what fatuous means." He smirks. Children should not smirk. Why are there no normal children on this island?

I narrowed my eyes, "Okay mister smarty pants, so what's it mean?"

"Promise not to hit me?" He asks.

"Maybe" I replied.

"It means stupid." I knocked him on the head.

He grabs his head in pain. "Hey you promised!"

I grinned. "I said maybe, I didn't promise nothing."

"You are such a-" Honk!

We turned towards the pier as the boat began to dock.

"See ya Charlie!" I said.

"Bye-bye lady!" He waved me off.

I packed up the things that I got out and went towards the dock. The loading and unloading plank was lowered to dock. I heard a thunk and a slam. Then a dog was on the plank.

I stared up at a familiar pit bull that was staring down at me. Hesitation could be felt between us. Then tentatively I called a name I didn't expect to use anytime soon, "Max?"

It didn't take that dog long to clear the plank and smash into my chest causing me to promptly fall flat on my ass.

I wrapped my arms around him in a hug. "Oh bud! I missed you soooo much!" I nuzzled my face into his body and stayed there until my feet started tingling.

"Too bad you're not a lap dog, now off."

He backed off me, tail wagging so much his whole hindquarters were moving with it, and his face had a huge Pitbull grin.

At the same time a very familiar person came walking down off the plank. "Hey cous'. Looks like Max got to greet you first." He laughed.

I smiled in disbelief. "Should of figured you get ta find me eventually, so Mark just how did you...?"

He glanced behind him. "A grumpy cowboy, with your brothers glare told me you were here."

He was knocked forward by the impact of a foot in reply. "Dumb ass."

I smirked at the voice, "Ah, come on now. You love us cowboy."

He growled. "You want your chicken or not?"

My gaze shifted to the white bird in Vaughn's arms. A squeal of delight escaped from my mouth. "BEST morning EVER!"

Mark snorted, "Better than the morning you found Gabe? Or the time where the family got together and threw you that huge surprise party when you were six, or the mornings where Aunt Renee came home from animal trips?"

I kicked him in the shins and flipped him the bird in response. "You ruin everything."

He rubbed his sore leg, "and you overreact to everything."

"I do not! My oh so dearest of cousins, whom would cry every time I would leave him alone, or would crawl into my bed at night because he had a wittle nightmare. Oh! Of course after seeing you with an absence of 6 months I was overjoyed to see you come off the boat! The birdie was just a point up to it this day being wonderful."

A blush flushed itself across Mark's cheeks. "R-really?"

I grinned an evil grin, "Hell no. I spent six bloody freaking months without animals. I resorted to wildlife as my saving grace the last week. The chicken was the icing and the cake to this morning."

His head fell. "good to see you haven't changed even a little bit in our absence." I laughed.

I saw Vaughn grin from the corner of my eyes. Dumbfounded I pointed and started jumping around like a monkey, "He smiles! It's a smile! Vaughn can smile!"

Mark looked at me in question. "Isn't it normal for people to smile?"

I shook my head. "Not Vaughn. Vaughn doesn't smile. You were on a boat with him and didn't notice? Even Julia said he doesn't. And Julia has been with him for like, ever!"

He quickly wiped off his grin and replaced it with a his typical scowl, "That's it. I'm taking the chicken back."

I grabbed his arm to stop him and he let the chicken go out of surprise. Time froze as I watched the chicken flap off the dock and into the water. Not even two seconds later I was diving in after it.

As cold water contacted with my skin an instinctive shiver of fear ran up my spine and short bursts of memories of floating through the sea drifting into and out of consciousness itched at the back of my mind. Ignoring my urge to panic, I resurfaced and looked for the chicken. I saw him flapping just out of arm's reach. I grabbed him and handed him off to somebody on the dock. Then I swam to shore and passed out.

* * *

****** I have a love hate feeling for this chapter. I love it because it shows a small side of Chelsea that isn't insanely easy to show even throughout the whole story but at the same time stays loyal to her character. I hate it because I feel there isn't enough detail but I don't know how to add in more without taking away some of the dialogue and in doing so take away some of the character. It's times like this that make me wish I had a writer Harvest Moon fan friend. Alas, though I have friends of many varieties Harvest Moon writers isn't one of them...Well enough with my useless griping let's get to the thanks and explanations!**  


******Katie xxxx- Thank You, seriously, it might be short but it's still very much appreciated. **

******Okay, first off I'd like to whine a little bit about the hangnail my dog got that had me feeling like a horrible owner who is desperately irresponsible especially when I didn't realize before I did it that touching a paw your dog is trying to keep off the ground is a horrible thing to do. I felt even worse when I looked up doggie hangnails online and it said to carefully remove the hanging part of the nail carefully with nail trimmers and that you should be careful because your dog might bite or growl at you involuntarily. He didn't do either. He didn't even whimper when he got it clipped even though he did when I accidentally touched the hangnail directly with my hands when he was trying to keep pressure away. I've never had more pride in my dog or more guilt in how I'm a horrible owner who should have been paying more attention to his dew claws length. I have no clue why I just told you guys that though... Oh well I wrote it so it stays. But he's all happy now and is using his paws pretty much just like before. So yeah... Okay now to informing you. Since originally this was one very long chapter and the way it is now is a cliff hanger I'm going to go have a chapter posted shortly after I post this one. I just have to look it over again first. So thank you all for reading, love to hear from you!  
**


	7. Vaughn steps in

**Vaughn**

* * *

I watched as Chelsea dived after the chicken that fell into the water without a second to spare. For a small period I wondered if she would resurface as bubbles started popping up where she dived in. '_Should I dive in after her?_'

Max whined slightly, then, thankfully she surfaced. She looked wildly around her and saw the chicken. She dove after it and raised it just above the dock. Mark took her, flailing claws, wings,beak and all, into his arms and held her. Then Chelsea swam towards the shore, reaching it, she collapsed.

"Chelsea!" Mark screamed in surprise. He ran to her and numbly I followed.

"What happened?" Chen asked worriedly rushing towards us.

"She jumped in after a chicken" I said. Chen ruffled his brows in confusion.

" Is she okay?" Charlie asked more worried than I've ever seen him.

"She should be. But she needs to get the wet clothes off her and warm up. The water should still have been too cold to be in from the winter and the cool spring air won't help. Charlie you go get Julia and Mirabelle. Tell them to go to Chelsea's"

"Right." He said, then took off.

I picked up Chelsea with shaking hands and Max gave a warning growl at me in response. "Down boy" Mark says listlessly.

I nodded my thanks to him and carried Chelsea to her ranch, Mark buzzing like a bee next to me, worrying about her.

Mark opened her house door and I walked in setting her down on her bed.

Immediately, I start running the water in her bathroom. When the tub was full of warm water I picked Chelsea up again and dropped her carefully in the tub. I watched as the bubbles swarmed up around her. I made sure she wouldn't go under the water and left the bathroom.

Mark was sitting on the couch, clutching onto the chicken which seemed more or less fine.

'_it probably would've taken a lot less time to just crawl up back on the dock.'_ I watched the chicken try to squirm out of Mark's grasp. Max was sitting solemnly next to him, laying across his feet.

I looked out the window towards the animal shop for a bouncy blonde, and her sweet mother next to her. I spotted them soon after.

I hurriedly opened the door at the sound of their knocks. "Did you call the doctor?"

Julia brushed right past me and looked around, "Where is she?" She asks while lifting up a cushion on the couch._'I'm not even going to ask about that.'_

Ignoring her, I turned to Mirabelle. She smiled soothingly, "Don't worry, the doctor should be coming as fast as he can."

Julia barged into the bathroom and saw Chelsea. After that she just stared at her with a peculiar expression on her face. She turned around on her heels and pointed at me. "You! This is your fault!" I stumbled back in surprise. "What?" was my unintelligible reply.

She went out into a rampage building herself up. "Yeah! If you were taking your job seriously, Chelsea wouldn't have had to dive into the water to get the chicken out. You're an animal transporter aren't you? Doesn't that mean the animals safety is your job until they reach their stop?!" I felt a swift rage boil in my stomach.

Julia was accusing me of being bad at my job. I don't take pride in many things, but I take pride in my job. I clenched my fists resisting the temptation to knock her out cold. "Excuse you?" I said,cool as humanly possible. Julia froze.

"Since when is it your job to insult me on mine? And the chicken wouldn't have gone in the water if Chelsea hadn't tried to grab it." I finished off with a yell.

"Enough!" Mark intervenes.

We turned to him in surprise.

He was shaking in a rage and glaring at me. To my surprise his glare seemed to freeze the room. Max was hiding behind his leg. His tail firmly tucked between his hind legs and trying to look as small as possible. "Where do you get off blaming Chelsea?" He said visibly building himself up. "What happened, happened. Do you have any idea how much blaming Chelsea could hurt her?" We stare at Mark, shocked.

He chuckled low under his breath. "No, of course you wouldn't. You're just an inconsiderate antisocial bastard of a cowboy." Mark turned.

Max raced out the door as if to run away from Mark and Mark followed him in a sheer rage, still holding the chicken-which was now cowering- and slamming the door as he left.

"What was that about? And who was he in the first place?" Julia asks.

I shrug my shoulders.

She huffs. "Fine. Don't tell me."

I rolled my eyes and went into the bathroom. The water was cooling to a lukewarm temperature. I put my hand on Chelsea's forehead to check her temperature. Her forehead felt hot.

I picked her up ,effectively soaking my clothes, and walked out of the bathroom with her dripping water. "What are you doing?" Julia asks.

I ignored her and laid Chelsea down on her bed. "Can you get her out of her clothes?" I ask Mirabelle, pulling down on my hat.

She gave a small smile to that, "of course if you're willing to leave." I blushed and scuttled out of the house.

Once outside and with a brief hesitation I decided it would be best to check on the water-logged chicken that Mark took off with. I found them both behind a barn.

Mark was doing his best to warm up the chicken which was almost impossible with his blue work gloves that went up just below his elbows on. As I approached him he was peeling his gloves off and I caught a sight of scars running down where the gloves had covered.

A branch snapped apart as I stopped. Mark whipped around and pulled his gloves around in a swift,practiced motion.

"What's with you!?" He yelled with panic slivering behind his eyes.

I pulled down my hat to hide my expression, "The chicken shouldn't be in danger if you just dry it off."

"Yeah, I know."

"Then you might need something to actually, you know dry him." I said irritated. He passed the chicken to me with a quick don't drop her and walked away. I let him and worked on drying off the chicken.

* * *

**Uggggggghhhhhh I don't like Mark. He gets better eventually but right now he is my most hated character type(Character type, not character, that would be Chelsea's dad which you haven't meet yet so you wouldn't know.) I think it's how he talks because he actions don't really bother me anymore than Elliot who just mildly irritates me by the way,(which is probably why you haven't seen hide, hair, nor tail from him even though I've mentioned a lot of other people) Vaughn is kinda nerdy and heroic in all of this, which even I found a little weird. Well I updated about as fast as I promised.**


	8. Family fight

**A/n **

**Hi! Welcome back. I thought it might be fun to pull my characters out of their story and into the a/n and explain what they think of the chapter, so without further ado, here's my dragon's bane to write, Mark! **

**Mark:... Really? **

**What?**

**Mark: Dragon's bane? **

**I want none of this from you, your annoying enough when writing as is. **

***_Mark rolls his eyes*_**

**So what did you think of my bully session for Chelsea and you in this chapter?_  
_**

**Mark: Wait, what? **

**You haven't read it?**

**Mark: No...What did you mean by bul-**

**Okay onto to show!**

**Mark:I wasn't done! I didn't even talk much!  
**

**You talk enough, besides, I'd spoil it anyway. So FORWARD! **

* * *

**Chelsea**

_It was the same nightmare again. The one that pops up after I've convinced myself I've gotten over it._

_"Mom, don't go!" A younger version of me calls out._

_My mom turns around, her gentle smile running across her face. That's when she began to disintegrate. It always starts on her right side, right at her heart. It eats slowly at her, as it grows bigger her kind smile is replaced with a grimace of pain and her cheeks start to hollow out._

_"Mom!" I yell chasing her._

_I know I won't reach her in time though. I never do. But I have to try._

_I come close to her, closer than ever before, my heart races making me think I might actually reach her this time. Then it speeds up and she's gone leaving the young me alone. I cry. She's gone. Slowly the particles come together and foolish hope rushes forward again. Maybe she'll be back?_

_No. The particles rush together to form my dad and his wife. My step mom's glare reaches out, piercing through me, telling me her cruel hatred for everything I am. I cower away from it, and look to my dad._

_He's not looking at me though, I don't know where he's looking but it's not at me. I cry for him to turn around to look at me. I try to reach him but I can't, that women's glare won't let me. It's pinning me to the ground, more effective than nails and chains. I watch as slowly the women begins to absorb my father and he's no more. It's just me and the women now._

_I'd rather had been left alone._

"Chelsea!" My eyes flutter open at a blessed shove that saves me from my nightmare.

I stare at Mark's concerned face.

"I am so never going to enjoy swimming." I moan.

He laughs in relief. "That makes two of us!"

He reaches forward and wipes the tears from my eyes.

An Awkward silence settles then.

Mark knows I only have one nightmare, and I was dumb enough to tell him the exact details of that and it to him one night.

"She can't reach you here you know. She doesn't even know this place exists. I didn't even know until that cowboy mentioned you.!"

I sighed,"You know how many times you've said this and it didn't come true? Happy endings won't come for me."

"What? Do you still believe it was your fault?" He says.  
I scoff."Duh. You've heard them talk. If she hadn't turned back for me, If she didn't try protecting me, If only I had stayed with the group like usual-"  
Mark cuts me off."Chelsea that's bullshit!"  
"You know it's not!" I bite back coldly, jumping out of the bed and breaking the vase in the scramble. "And if it wasn't for me you wouldn't have been caught up in this! Dad would have been the same man, more worried for kin than for money. He wouldn't have cut off Aunt Mer and Uncle Luke when he did! You wouldn't have had to been involved in every shitty fight that came from your parents blaming each other or you! You wouldn't have been cornered!" I grab his arm and pull his gloves off, revealing his scars that lace up and down his arms. "You wouldn't have done what you've done!" I cry in a cold rage.  
"Chelsea..." Mark reaches towards me trying to comfort me in some way. I reject it by throwing his gloves back at him.

"Knock it off! Quit getting concerned! Hate me! It's easier you know!" Mark tries again, taking another step towards me. Pain's burned onto his face. I couldn't stand the sight of it a thin veil of guilt settles in my gut.

"Just get the hell out!" I lash.

He draws back as if bitten and leaves.

I stand there in self loathing.

I've done it again. I know the reasons why Mark can't hate me but I can't accept them. Rather, I refuse to accept them even if I could. I take a step forward and pain pierces my foot. I look down at it and see a shard of the broken vase. Carelessly, I remove the shards and blood begins to bubble up and fill out the cracks of the cut. Like tears it spills out, rolls down my foot and splashes against the wood of the house. Memories of that night crosses through my mind before my vision blurs. I try focusing in on one of them and the room spins. A thud booms out as my head hits the wooden floor.

* * *

**So, I have done a mean thing. It's called the cliff hanger of doom and it wishes to torment you through your week. Plus, I'm not even done yet. This chapter makes me paranoid, I have no plans to remove it because it leads up to something but I really would love to hear your comments on it. Ah, and if you can't figure it out, I'm oddly hyper today.  
**

**Mark: And yesterday, and the day before, and the day before, and the day befor-**

**Don't make me erase you, now get out of my note. **

**Mark: You have Chelsea and I get into a fight, and you think I wouldn't bother you even a little? What the heck was that anyway?**

**Dude, shut up, I am not a planing type, I'm a doer. **

**Mark: You're an idiot who needs more tact.**

**And you're being cruel, don't save all your niceness just for Chelsea. Creepy cousin. *shoves Mark back into the story.***

**No, no I'm not high. I'd just liked to say this. It's just my chapter today didn't fit my mood today. That's all. Thank you my 2(?) new followers!(one person quit following but they still have this marked as a favorite so yeah.) I have no clue why but my dog is really gassy today and has decided to sit near my head. So , yeah, this was a bit of a short chapter...my apologies. Did you know sleep is a good thing that lets you keep your mind focused? Just imagine what would happen if I tried finishing _Try _like this. It'd be caffeinated crack essentially, especially with Chelsea who is rapidly becoming more and more fun to write with her rapid mood swings brought on by becoming fairly easy to be bored and a crazy past that we'll get into later. I'd also like to say this. Unlike a lot of my chapters, this one is actually a bit more raw and hasn't been edited as often. I don't know why that is so don't ask but I just thought my 2 cents could hold value right now if there were any small errors. Anyway, thank you for reading! See ya next week!Also, Fairy-san, I legit just read your review like 2 minutes before posting this. I kid you not. But that's a different thing entirely from what I was going to say. Thanks for reading and reviewing, makes this author very happy. :). I think I really need some sleep so I'm going to finish off the chapter(which is a bit ahead of this) I'm working on and go to bed, (I'm a night child to the extremes.) So I hope you all enjoyed this, can't wait to update!  
**


	9. Just more damage

**A/n Ow ow ow ow ow ow. Being sick sucks. I haven't written a single thing this week so it's unfortunately starting to all catch up together. I feel a little bad for Chelsea but she'll figure something out eventually, but will Vaughn? Let's ask! My favorite Harvest Moon character and one of the more preferred characters to write, say hi to Vaughn!  
**

**Vaughn:...**

**This again?**

**Vaughn: Again?**

**Yeah Mark wasn't really chatty either. So what'd you think?**

**Vaughn: Chelsea's retarded. **

**Anything else other than insults?**

***crickets chirping starts up***

**okay then...and you guys wonder why Chelsea gets the most words per chapter.**

**Vaughn: Yeah, but mine are usually better written.**

**Just because I suck at dialogue... Whatever, I'm not starting arguments with characters this week on debatable topics, I am sick remember.**

**Vaughn: Whatever. *jumps back into story***

**HEY I WASN'T DONE YET! Oh well, have fun reading "just more damage" in _Try!_**

* * *

I wake up tightly tucked into my bed. My foot's been wrapped and the glass has been cleaned up. I checked the alarm and it flashes a 12:00. I sigh irritated.

I sit up and attempt to get out of bed but the minute my foot hits the ground pain shoots up through my foot forcing a whimper. Something moves on the couch in response. I had a mini freak out and jumped back enough in the bed to smash my head into the wall.

"OW Ow ow ow ow...So not my day..." I mumble out rubbing a swelling bump on my head.

The thing on the couch got up revealing itself to be a tall male silhouette. I knew it wasn't Mark due to the bigger build but no one really came to mind when I saw it. Realizing this I freaked out just a little bit more and grabbed the radio alarm clock.

Quickly, I compose myself enough to give a convincingly threatening "who's that?"

"Easy wouldn't want to break your broken clock." A calm southern drawl came with a laugh.

Two and two clicked and I knew who it was.

"Vaughn why are you here?...wait my clocks not broken!"

He steps towards the door and flips on the lights. "Guy finds a farmer girl passed out on the floor and he can't stick around to make sure she wakes up okay? And how would you know? You don't even use the damn thing!"

"He could if he wasn't Vaughn." I say with a joke ignoring any further clock talk.

Vaughn glares at me in response. I look him up and down when I notice he looks different. He's wearing his usual black jeans and for some reason he slept with his boots on. But his hat, belt, gloves and vest are on the table next to the coach. His shirt has also been unbuttoned about three buttons down and though it doesn't show much it does let you know that Vaughn is a very toned man.

His silver hair is shaggy from sleep. The hat no longer being on his head also shows off his violet eyes and it's this that I'm drawn to. Like before, the sight of his eyes dives deep into my core and I can't look anywhere else. He grabs his hat in defense of my stares and plops it on his head breaking the spell. I drop the clock on the bedside and prop my head up on my hand to look at him.

"That's twice now."

He stares at me confused but asks nothing as if he feels he won't like the answer. He's probably right to. I let the silence sit as I shuffle in the covers of my bed to get out.

"Well this has been fun but I really need to get to wor-ahh!" I yell out as my foot touches the ground, I grit my teeth and try walking anyway.

"What do you think you're doing?" Vaughn says standing right in front of me blocking me from moving or falling. Whichever comes first.

"What does it look like? I'm trying to get to work! Now if you'll excuse me." I try to move past him but bump against his shoulder and fall.

Vaughn quickly catches me."You're not going anywhere with that foot. Under normal circumstances it'd be stitched up."

"I'll do what I want!" I say stubbornly and try to move past him again, but instead he just sweeps me up in his arms and drops me onto the bed.

"1. It's midnight. No logical person would go out this late. 2. You can barely walk. You think you can work? And 3, I already handled everything that needed immediate attention when I saw you weren't going anywhere yesterday." I refused to look at him after that. In my head I knew he was right but I couldn't accept it.

"So what do you want me to do?" I say defiantly.

"Rest like a good little idiot and not screw up your foot worse and force those who hate you to do your work."

A red heat surged through me at the word hate. I mean I could guess, but that didn't mean he had to say it.

"That's just it. You don't like me so I shouldn't be able to trust you to do my work now should I?" I lash out the words with irritation. If I'm not careful I'll say or do something I know I'll regret but I'm too stubborn to take it back. I can't care right now though, if I do, I lose. Lose what, I don't really know,it's probably just a pride thing but I just feel like I'll lose.

"You think I'd slack because I hate someone, when a whole island depends on their work?" Vaughn says, offended.

He's right and I know this, but he said that word again and that's the only thing I can focus on. I clutch onto it and finally snap the string that is my reason.

"So? I do cruel things just 'cause I'm bored. You hate me. Why shouldn't an island suffer if it means I squirm. That's how you are, isn't it?" I sneer at him.

Part of me is screaming, telling me to take it back, but that part is too easy to ignore with the red rage that's now consuming me. Even if I know I'm spouting venomous lies.

His reaction to my words reminds me of lightning striking a tree. Striking it down the middle and either burning all it touches or setting it afire.

I could've sworn I saw a black shroud cloud over his face as well.

"I'm not someone like that, if that's how you are then fine. I wish you well rotting in hell." He gathered all his stuff, turns to leave and slams the door on the way out.

The instant the door made contact with the frame everything that fueled that episode let me come back to reasoning and I was left with the same voice that told me not to spout shit in the first place.

I look over at the clock and it flashes its red time: 12:10. Apparently, Ten minutes are all it takes to screw myself up.

I grab the clock, fling it across the room and watch as it shatters against the wall, plastic pieces and circuit boards rushing to fill its own space on the floor.

I stare at the pieces and tears surge forward.

'_why am I like this?_' I scream in my head. '_why? why?why?why? WHY?'_

I slam down on my pillow and cry myself to sleep in frustration.

* * *

**Right, so if you couldn't tell, or just don't read everything at the top, I've been sick recently. Started Tuesday and my head's been pounding from sinus issues ever since. In other words, this week nothing has gotten done. Which kind of sucks. But, oh well. Also, somehow, I think I'm slightly smarter when sick, because I've had 4 tests and I blew my teachers out of the waters on all of them. Which was really, really, cool. Especially with Geometry that I suck at, it was 91% not perfect, but considering I was thinking I was going to bomb it, hey I'll take it! Enough about me and my real life, especially the evil S-word part of it, I have five more weeks to go before not getting any chapters done is going to show some visible issues *groans inwardly*. So in five weeks, be warned. Anyway, onto the thanks!  
**

**It's a fairly short list this week which is bad and good. Good because if it was really a long list I might not write my thanks but bad because I love to check the stats every day and see what's different. Fairy-san, I'm assuming the 3 was :3 in which I'm really, really glad you were happy with the story/update. Also, I just noticed(because I'm really, really slow and suck at paying attention) that you're a _Fairy Tail_ fan and if it doesn't seem too weird(or creepy, or stalkerish, or freakish, or hey-this-person-obviously-doesn't-have-a-life-what-have-I-gotten-into-ish) I was curious who your favorite characters was in it and/or your favorite coupling. You can go ahead and reply in a review, pm, or just ignore me, whatever's cool with you I'm fine with. Well that's enough with being a creeper... Anyway thanks go out to all my readers and regulars! You all are awesome and it makes me happy that you've somehow, in a way, found that this story was a good way to pass time. **

**P.s. Why is that all my notes are really...off the wall? It's kind of rhetorical so you don't have to answer that, but seriously, they're really just everywhere. Thank you for reading!(now if they just went down a little and reviewed some more...Ack! they can see my thoughts! Abort!Abort! Run away! jk, silent supporters are cool in their own rights as well.) Again, I say ow, and tell you all to have a lovely night!(and the answer is yes, I am seriously just deciding to go to bed at 12:41 even though I'm sick. You know people like me probably get sick for a reason... )**


	10. Unstable

**A/n Natalie and Julia I have no clue why I've imagined them as the type to leave at gore. It doesn't really fit either one when you really think about it, oh well, I think I just didn't want to deal with them later on was why I did it. *shrugs* Now say hi to my fav, the one who is always a joy to write even when I'm being cruel. Helloooooo Chelsea! *Chelsea jumps out of the story*  
**

**Chelsea: Yo! **

**So what did you think?**

**Chelsea: *snickers* Don't quit your day was right, your dialogue sucks.**

***chucks book at Chelsea***

**Chelsea:*Glares back***

**Uhhh...sorry...**

**Chelsea:Hahahahaha. You're so weak! You backed down too quickly!**

**Um. I'm not dumb enough to fight someone I personally wrote strong enough to kick my butt up and down the whole country of America. **

**Chelsea: And I thank you for that. Although you and I need to work on my temper.**

**You're telling me. Anyway I think we should get on with it don't you?**

**Chelsea: Chaos! Let the chaos rain chocolate!**

* * *

I wake to insistent slamming on my door.

"It's not freakin' locked!" I scream from underneath my pillow.

The door bangs open causing me to jump. I hear footsteps coming closer and then my pillow and blanket are ripped from me.

"It burns!" I shout as evening light hits my eyes.

"Why aren't you up yet?" Julia asks next to a smirking Natalie who's holding my pillow and blanket.

I will get her back for this.

"Why's it matter? It's not like I'd be able to work or move if I got up in the first place." I say motioning towards my foot wrapped in heavily bloody bandages.

"What the hell did you do?" Natalie exclaims in worry.

"Stepped on some glass."

"Glass? Okay, but what's with the broken clock." Julia says motioning towards the discarded plastic pieces of what used to be my clock.

"uhhh-May I skip this question please?"

"Sure, if you tell me what you did to Vaughn." Julia says this while folding her arms and cocking her hip stubbornly to the side. No skips for this one.

"Um...let's go back to the other question." I said.

"So it's your fault after all?" Natalie says annoyed.

Julia smirks and holds out her hand."Pay up." Natalie obliges and hands her a twenty which she then pockets.

"What the hell! You guys betted on me? What was the bet?" I ask.

"It was actually a series of bets. Bet 1. Vaughn being pissed off beyond reasoning in the middle of the night was your fault." Natalie says.

"That was a dumb thing to bet against in the first place" Julia says smiling.

"Excuse me for having some faith in my friend."

"Oh I had faith. I just had faith she'd piss off Vaughn." Julia laughs.

A small pang of guilt hits me. I brush it off.

"And?"

"Oh the second bet was that something in here would be broken, and the third was that you'd be injured." Julia motions towards my foot and the pieces.

"Hold on. Vaughn's not responsible for either one of these!" I cry out in defense.

Julia rolls her eyes. "Mhm sure hun. Defend mister violent."

"No! I'm serious! Vaughn's not violent! I knocked over a glass vase in a fight with Mark and I broke my clock when I-uh" I hesitated slightly embarrassed. "When I threw it across the room after Vaughn left."

Natalie whistled. "Damn, temper there. I'm counting and that's two fights in one day. What'd the poor boys do to deserve that?"

I blushed a violent red and the guilt I brushed off came back in a fury.

"Honestly they didn't." I said.

"So why'd you go off?" Julia asked.

I buried my head between my knees and refused to answer.

Of course, even If I tried I still probably couldn't answer them considering I didn't really know why myself.

I swear I could feel both girls roll their eyes.

Natalie sighed. "You're not going to apologize either, are you?"

I tightened my grip around my legs.

"Well it's not like we came here to force you. We just wanted information to soothe the beast."

I looked at Julia, "What the hell are you talking about?"

As if in answer I heard a familiar booming whine of a big dog and my stomach dropped.

"Please tell me-"

Then I'm attacked with insistent licking from my ex-dog Max. An embarrassed Mark and cool Vaughn follow him in.

" . Way."

The two girls smirk, a quick small glare and I effectively have them lose their smirks.

"Chelsea are you okay?" Mark asks me.

I give him a calming smile. "Don't worry, it looks worse than it feels." Vaughn snorts.

Mark winces a bit next to him. "Vaughn and I handled your work. I would've done it myself but the chicken tried to kill me."

I look over at Vaughn and he flips me off. I flinch.

I'm learning quickly that Vaughn knows what to say and do to get the exact reactions that he wants. Especially when he wants something to hurt.

Mark practically growls at him.

Vaughn just smirks, "Down boy, it's not like she didn't have that coming."

"So you're still mad." I say weakly.

Vaughn rolls his eyes and tugs his hat down.

The guilt I had is still weighing heavily on my gut. I want to apologize but for some reason I still can't.

Natalie and Julia fidget nervously.

The only thing that could be heard was Max's insistent whines as he begged for more attention. I patted him lightly on the head.

Suddenly, my stomach lets out a loud growl, Max pricks his ears and leaves the room.

Julia and Natalie try to jump on the chance."We'll go get you some food."

"HELL NO!" I scream.

Mark jumps and Vaughn smirks.

They turn towards me looks of disbelief evident on their faces.

"Why not?"They ask.

"I don't want to die that's why. Natalie you might not be as bad at cooking as Julia but that's only because your foods edible. I don't want to even think about what would happen if you two cooked together."

I shuddered.

The two girls start to pout. I laugh, "Besides, I think Max has this." I motion towards Mark's dog coming in, carefully carrying in a tray I specially designed for dogs with a bottle of water, a bag of my favorite chips, a can of peaches, and a bowl with a spoon in it all set haphazardly on top of it. He marches up next to my bedside and drops the tray carefully on it. The two girls gape at him.

Even Vaughn is visibly taken aback by that.

Mark laughs, "Cool, I didn't know he was still trained to do that!"

I laughed at him. "What, so just because the owner changes the dog loses all his knowledge?"

Mark shrugs.  
Max places his head on my bed and wags his tail, I pat him for his reward.

"How in Sam's hell did you train that dog to do that?" Vaughn asked, awestruck.

I shrug with a slight laugh, thankful he doesn't still seem bitter. "I can train any animal you can keep as a pet to do anything. It's kind of like a family talent only passed on to the girls. My mom was even better, she could train wild animals and gain their trust almost completely."

Vaughn scrunched his eyes, "You said your parents couldn't stand that you kept animals."

I fidget a bit. "Yes and no, my late mom loved and trusted all animals, but Selena, my step, thinks they're nothing but dirty creatures. My dad just goes with whatever his wife says."

The room gets quiet at the revelation of my Mom being dead.

When the silence feels like it hurts Mark jumps in. "I thought she liked cows though?"

I snorted, "Dude, she TOLERATES cows, and that's only because she likes really high quality milk. I tried bringing up keeping a pet cow and I swear I was frozen for a week."

Mark guffaws in laughter and Julia and Natalie let out nervous laughter.

"You should've just went and got the cow anyway. Bitch would've had it coming." Mark sneers.

"I would've, I even went through some of the paperwork." I say. Intentionally clipping off what stopped me for dramatic effect.

"So why didn't you? Nothing seemed to stop you before." Vaughn asks taking all of us back that even he can be curious.

I laughed nervously. "She went through my stuff and saw the papers. Then she went to my dad and complained, he threatened me saying if I got a cow he'd have it butchered and force me to eat it. Of course I couldn't even think about risking it after that threat." I glared at the thought.

Mark clicked his teeth and shook his head.

"She sounds like the world's biggest bitch ever." Julia said.

I huffed. "You don't even know the half of it."

Mark popped open my bag of chips.

"Did'ya know that when you went up missing she went to me? Threatened me and everything. I'm glad I really didn't know. The crazy hag had me cowering by the time she was done with it. She probably could've robbed me blind and I would've just let her at the point." Mark said nonchalantly.

I ducked my head in shame. "Sorry about that Mark." He waved me off.

"Don't worry about it. It's not like she really could've made things worse for me in the first place. It's just her...you know." I rolled my eyes.

"Oh yeah. I know. You didn't live with her."

Mark shook his head again. "You are ten times stronger than I'll ever be."

I leaned over and took the chips from his hands. "Good thing you know that at least. It'll keep you from doing the same shit I do."

Mark laughs, "Then maybe you shouldn't do it?"

I laugh as well. "You know that saying. Do as I say, not as I do."

"Well your sister has started to take after you. She's been taking over your place in the house with bringing home strays. Selena was furious when a few days before I left Kalie brought home an injured cobra." I choked on my chip.

"What the hell is that girl doing bringing home shit like cobras!? She's going to get herself killed! Where'd she even find it?!" Mark laughed.

"Probably the same place you found things off the wall like baby crocodiles or horses, goats, didn't you even bring a boa constrictor home for a short time?" Mark teased.

"I didn't plan to keep it!Plus none of those had venom! And even if they did at least I know the proper steps to treat venomous bites and know how to properly handle 45 common venomous animals and 68 poisonous ones like a dart frog!" I cry.

Mark smirks, "Didn't you learn the last one the hard way?" I chuck my pillow at him. He dodges it cleanly and I pout.

Natalie and Julia are at this are point dying of laughter and even Vaughn is smiling.

"Shut up!" I yell, annoyed. It had the opposite of my desired effect.

After what seemed to me an hour of laughter at my expense but could only have been at most ten minutes,(clocks would be nice for this thing huh?) they settled down.

"Satisfied?"

"Very." Julia says, wiping a tear from her eye.

"By the way, I didn't know you had a sister." Natalie says, flopping onto my bed.  
I nod. "Half-sister, she's only 14 but she acts just like I did at her age. Well sort of."  
_'14 was the age when I lost my mom. So if she acted exactly like I did, I'd be a bit worried for her._' I thought.  
"Anyway despite who her mom is, she's not anything like her except in the looks, which is for the best. Considering that she's sweeter than sugar yet stubborn as a bull and absolutely adorable. She's possibly one of the most spoiled people you'll ever find. Even I can't stand not giving her what she wants." Natalia whistles at the statement.  
"Would I like to meet your sister." She says.  
"I'd love to see her too but I'd have to get past the hell dog to see her. So unless I hear she's been crying, I'll pass." I say waving it off.  
I shift a bit in bed and something bumps my foot. I wince.  
Mark jumps to action. Immediately he begins rummaging thru drawers looking for fresh bandages and antiseptic creams. Before anyone else even could get a chance to offer help, he'd found them and began to unwrap my blood spotted ones.  
I flinched at the sight.  
The wound started at the balls of my feet and stretched in a cruel type of broken C down to my heel. It was white from trapped moisture the bandages caused and was currently weeping liquid from being opened. Although it didn't look infected even I could figure that wouldn't last long if I went around walking on it. Julia gagged and left in a hurry, Natalie followed her out when Mark started replacing the butterfly bandages.  
I looked over at Vaughn and he stared back expressionless. I remembered last night and how despite how I was acting, for the most part he kept me off my feet. Then I looked down at Mark making sure my feet are well bandaged and how on the same night I'd intentionally hurt him to drive him off. Although one of them is still pissed neither one gave up on me.  
I started to cry.  
Mark looked up startled.

"Are you okay Chelsea? Did I apply too much pressure?" Mark asked worried.

I shook my head and just started blubbering.

"Hey." I looked up at Vaughn towering over me. "What's wrong?" He asks.

"I'm sorry!" I wailed covering my eyes with the back of my hands.

Vaughn just stood off awkwardly in the corner as I cried on Mark's shoulders

I thoroughly soaked the shoulder of his shirt blubbering apologies during the whole thing until I passed out from exhaustion.

* * *

**Chelsea: You could have ended that better you know.**

***sighs* I could have done a lot of things. Unfortunately I'm lazy and suffering from 'damn I've been sick so much that now that I'm better I don't want to do anything lately' **

**Chelsea: Your math grade is suffering from that you know.**

***groans* Don't remind me. I'm just glad I managed to labor past that really annoying chapter Vaughn had most recently.**

**Chelsea: Oh you mean the one where he-**

**NO SPOILERS! **

**Chelsea: Oh. Right. Sorry. **

**Why is it so easy to apologize to me but not to your important boys?**

**Chelsea: *snorts* because it doesn't mean anything when it's something small like that.**

**I got you to admit they were important!**

**Chelsea:*smacks my head* Of course they're important. That's why apologizing is hard.**

***rolls eyes* Thanks Chels'. I can just feel the love. **

**Chelsea: *smirks* Well, I'm going to go take care of Maris. See ya!**

**Right. *Chelsea jumps back into story* I think I'm having more fun with my ramblings than anything else lately. Anyway, I didn't get any reviews, which to be honest, made me horribly sad but I'll get over it. Just like for the most part I kicked my cold and am getting over a really annoying dry throat. I think I might do an Easter special chapter, but I'm not too sure about how I'd go about it. Maybe I'll add it in as a bonus chapter, maybe I'll just make it a one shot. Well, that's if I write it. Anyway, thank you everyone for reading and if there's anything that's been annoying I'd like to dearly apologize(while adding Chelsea's viewpoint on that is not the same as my own. An apology is always important, it's just when you screwed up so bad you don't feel like an apology is enough that it gets hard)for it and say that you're amazing in your own way with just dealing with it so far and continuing to read on. (of course if there's anything I could do to fix it I'd be glad to hear as well.) All right. Hope you enjoyed. See ya next week!**


	11. past

**A/n I almost forgot to update. Even though I was thinking on the story all day. Weird. Anyway, I'm not really sure about this chapter, it feels like I'm pushing the characters a bit, so if it seems weird, sorry. Also, I forgot to say this, other than the original character's names of the Harvest moon series, meaning they existed before I cam across them, all the names in this story were carefully selected to give a little background knowledge on the character/animal. For example, Gaberial is a messenger of God , Maris means 'of the sea', and so on, so when ever a new name pops up and it wasn't some other character in Harvest Moon, I recommend looking it up. Except Max. Max was just the name of one of my dogs' who is dead. He was a great dog so he just got put in here with out too much thought. Anyway, today, I can't easily pull out any characters without them spoiling anything so I'm sorry for that. Next week will be fine though. Anyway, I wish you the best as you read "past"  
**

* * *

**Mark**

When I felt Chelsea's body get heavier against mine I knew it was safe to move.

I picked her up, laid her in bed and tucked her in.

"What was that?" The cowboy asked. I still couldn't remember his name. Chelsea's going to get pissed if I don't make even what seems to be an effort to remember his name.

When I felt Chelsea's body get heavier against mine I knew it was safe to move.

I picked her up, laid her in bed and tucked her in.

"What was that?" The cowboy asked. I still couldn't remember his name. Chelsea's going to get pissed if I don't make even what seems to be an effort to remember his name.

"Hey, where's her dog?" I asked fearing the worst.

He shrugged, "Don't know."

I growled a bit under my breath. "That was what happens when Chelsea doesn't have Gabe. She becomes emotionally unstable."

His eyebrow twitched, "Seriously?"

I nodded my head. He and I stared each other down.

"What are the chances of him still being alive?" I asked tentatively.

"In my opinion, higher than the chances of him being dead."

I let out a huge sigh I didn't even know I was holding.

"Why does her dog have such a huge effect on her?" Vaughn asks.

I look at him solemnly and stare into his eyes. They were the type of eyes that at first glance seemed uncaring, but if you actually looked into them were laced with so many different emotions that they reminded me a little of Chelsea. So, for that reason, despite all evidence of him proving otherwise to me, I trusted him.

"To tell you that I'd have to tell you about her mom's death." I stared hard at him daring him to back off. "You sure you want to know?"

He nodded his head without hesitation.

I sigh, "We should probably go somewhere else then, in case Chelsea wakes up."

I leave Chelsea's farm and head to the hotel. I nodded to the desk man and his wife as I passed them and went into my room motioning for Vaughn to come in.

He does.

I kick off my shoes and fall onto the coach. "What's your name again?"

He pulls out a wooden chair and sits himself. "Vaughn."

"Right. Vaughn. Aunt Renee, Chelsea's mom, was as you can tell, big on animals. She worked as an animal trainer and was known as the world's best, having trained animals that even now had never been able to be trained. She also loved taking educational hikes with different people and teaching them all she knew. It was on one of these hikes that she died."

"What happened?" Vaughn asks.  
I shift my position on the couch. "Chelsea saw some animal and followed it. After a while she got lost ,slipped down a hill and into a river that took her to a cliff right at it's bend. It effectively broke 2 of her ribs and her ankle and made it impossible to go anywhere. Of course when we figured out Chelsea was missing all hell broke loose."  
"Everyone searched for her. Of course the only one who managed to find her was Aunt Renee. No one else really understood her other than her mom. From what I heard, Aunt Renee backtracked a couple of miles and her dogs were able to pick up the scent. Only problem was there wasn't any safe way to get to Chelsea, of course you couldn't tell her that. Aunt Renee lived for impossible. She sent the dogs away to get help and climbed down to help. What happened after that, no one really knew exactly. The only thing we knew was from what Chelsea told us and that wasn't much.  
When we found them, there was a gaping hole in Aunt Renee's chest that somehow didn't really have much blood around it and a Chelsea who looked like she had a bucket of blood dropped on her. The policemen said it was caused by a jagged rock that Aunt Renee managed to fall on when she slipped off the cliff, but there were no scrapes on her hands nor were there rocks at the bottom. It was just clay. The cliff itself wasn't exceptionally hard to climb down it was just the getting back up that would have been the impossible issue. The weird thing of it all was that Chelsea and her mom were found just at the top of the cliff, but the blood stains surrounded the bottom and there was no blood trail leading up to where they were."  
"Aunt Renee was heavily depended on in our family. She brought together everyone and garnered success for everyone wherever she went. So when she died it went nothing but downhill fast. A fourth of the people in our family's situation got so bad they decided to commit suicide."

"Of course humans are unreasonable creatures. When something goes wrong usually something or someone has to be blamed. A lot of the blame went to Chelsea, some people like my parents blamed themselves for not keeping a better eye on Chelsea, but Uncle Toby's reaction, Chelsea's dad, was the weirdest of all. He blamed everything. He immediately began rejecting anything that reminded him of Aunt Renee, animals, nature, family, even Chelsea he barely put up with. Right now he's a bitter man focused on nothing but his can guess what that would do to a 14 year old girl who'd just lost her Mom."

"Chelsea began to reject reality more and more as the situation kept getting worse. When Uncle Toby married Selena she got so bad the family who still cared for her even began to think she should be instituted. Then one day out of nowhere, she got better. I confronted her on it. Turns out she found a stray beagle out on the streets when she was wandering aimlessly. On impulse, she took it in. She said as the dog began to trust her and depend on her more and more she started seeing that her mom was dead, not her. She named the dog Gabriel, a fitting name to be honest but she calls him Gabe for short. Gabe reinstated her love for animals and eventually as the situation around her turned worse, she started going out on the street collecting stray animals. She would train the animals and force different family members who were suffering to come visit them. Gradually, everyone started getting better. Everyone except her dad that is.

"Whatever the reason, the more Chelsea gets better the more Uncle Toby rejects her as a person. At one point, Selena started jumping in making Chelsea's life living hell. At that point, Chelsea kind of gave up on humans. You can't immediately tell it from how she acts but when you put her in a room with animals you can see the difference."

"How?" Vaughn asks.

"You can notice that she'll acknowledge animals as something as equals sometimes she'll even show an amount of respect reserved for royalty for certain animals as well. But when you compare how she treats a random animal to how she is with people she's close to, it can be compared to a destructive,fickle child's favorite toy to a loyal,loving child's favorite younger sibling. With humans as the near breaking toy."

Vaughn nods his head. "Explains why I got tackled from a roof the first day I met her."

I gag on my laughter. Vaughn looks at me with his eyebrows raised.

"Sorry. That just reminded me of the time when she forced me to go bungy jumping. Right before I jumped she said this, 'I hope I got the length right' then when it settled in and I was about to back out, she pushed me. She's just like that at first."

"At first?" Vaughn asks.

"When she first meets someone she finds interesting she'll do something extreme to catch their attention. She'll usually mellow out when you get to know her."

"Like a child?"

"Very much like a child." I say grinning.

Vaughn shakes his head.

"You know you kind of remind me of her."

He jerks his head up. "How so?"

I laugh, "Easy there. It's not your actions just your eyes. You have eyes so similar to her's that it kind of makes me think you might be able to help her."

He glares. "I'm not going to be her freakin' therapist."

I laugh again. "Don't worry. Just be yourself. If I'm right that alone will help, if I'm wrong, good luck dude."

Vaughn growls and leaves. I laugh as he goes.

* * *

**First off I'd like to apologize. I didn't really realize that people were going out of character and I should have been more careful with that, at the same time if you see me doing it again please warn me because I don't really write everything with the same mindset or reviewed at the same time. So it's fairly easy for me to acidently to get the character wrong because of that. Sorry. Truthfully what I need is a beta but I'm really picky so finding one is a little more difficult than it should be... **

**Anyway moving on. I did decide to do a Easter special which, if everything goes well, should be out on late Sunday as a chapter from way back in the past when Chelsea's mom was still alive meaning I will post it onto "Try". It's kind of filler but shows a few characters in a somewhat newer light so I'd recommend reading it if you want something to pass the time. **

**Okay now to my thank to the readers and reviewers.**

**Horsegirl10: OMG THANK YOU! You didn't have to review on earlier chapters but you did so thanks for putting in the effort. You seriously made this author happy. C:**

**Mryhh: Like I said, I am SO sorry. I didn't even realize I did that ,even though it should have been obvious. TT-TT But I'm really glad you didn't stop reading, oh and no worries, even if it kills me, I will not drop a story. If it catches up to itself the time between uploads may be longer but that's about it. **

**Fairy-san: Hi, again! Thanks for reading the next chapter. :)**

**Also, Thanks for all my silent readers who, for whatever your reasons may be, don't favorite ,follow, or review, but always come back to read the next chapter. All of you guys are awesome!**

**Alright, see you next week. Promise I won't forget like I almost did today!**


	12. Selena the Step

**A/n Hey. Right now I'm dog tired since it's Monday and trying very hard not to fall asleep as I right this sentence. So to be perfectly honest, the last thing I wanted to do was update, but, due to events I'll explain later, I didn't upload on Saturday and I would feel awful if I didn't upload as soon as possible. This chapter is EXTREMELY short and doesn't have a single VaughnxChelsea moment in it, BUT it's very important to the story and you'll see when you read. So, enjoy reading the latest chapter of 'Try'!  
**

* * *

**Selena**

I paced my room. Unsure of what to do. Chelsea has been missing for about a year now. Just as I was about to give up tracking her, Mark disappears. Of course I found out where he went off to easily enough.

It was some little island near nowhere named Sunshine Islands. A bit of a redundant name, but grudgingly I had to admit the land had promise. Upon further investigations, I was able to find out that Chelsea was indeed alive and well on those very islands. She was currently the reason for it thriving in fact. Providing all the food needs and income for the island.

Now the only thing I had to decide is what I'd do with this information.

I could go to the island myself and confront her. But what purpose would that serve? In the first place she's not doing anything I could really confront her on there. In fact she's actually being more productive there than she's ever been anywhere else. A fact she'd be sure not to overlook.

I could force her to come back with me. But she's 22, too old for me to force her to do anything. Mark would defend her on that.

I could guilt her back. But the only possible way to do that would be to use her animals and she and I both know I'm not going anywhere near the things.

I could tell her, her father misses her. But that would be a cruel joke I wouldn't wish on the worst of my enemies.

Maybe I should just leave her be. Its not like shes hurting anyone other there. And if she does start to cause a few issues I could go get her then.

Just as I think that, my daughter Kalie walks in carrying a small alligator with tape wrapped around its mouth.

"Mom have you seen the water trough anywhere? You know the really big ones Chelsea would use some times in the pastures?"

My eyes nearly popped out of their sockets. "Kalie! What are you doing with that?!"

She looked down at the crocodile then back up at me. She shrugs."I found it."

"Go put it back where you got it!" I scream. Genuinely terrified.

She pouted. "Nu uh. They'll kill it." Alligators are a fairly common sight in North Carolina where we live and are generally shot when seen on property.

"Then let them!" I scream at her exasperated.

She looked like she was about to cry. "Chelsea wouldn't like it if they killed him."

My words caught in my throat. Kalie turns and runs out the room, gator in toll. There is no way she really had a clue about what she was doing, Chelsea's never really taught her, just let her watch.

There is no way my daughter's going to endanger herself like this. So, rather she agrees or not, I have to get Chelsea.

* * *

***Yawns* I'm sorry guys, still sleepy, Monday's suck. However I owe it to my faithful followers(I got two more this week! *Cries tears of joy*) to explain why I'm late. So, last week was Spring break for my school and my family went down to Iowa to visit family. I really didn't take me long to realize, much to my horror, there was no one no where with free wi-fi. No wi-fi meant no internet which is where I keep everything which is where I need to connect to upload so hey, couldn't upload. But if it helps I was stuck five days without internet and lots of little kid cousins who shriek a lot and expect me to pick them up and swing them around EVERY time they ask so I was suffering the whole time. But enough with my gripping, on to the thanks! **

**Mryhh- TT-TT is essentially a crying face with lots of water works. Kind of like T_T but the head is turned up and it's sadder(in my mind). About Sabrina, my biggest issue is not forgetting about her. As for making her evil, I think that has a large part of people getting jealous and not liking the fact that Vaughn nearly went for the spoiled rich girl, but throughout the whole game she's like, REALLY nice so it's kind of cruel to make her evil or hated. I do have a small plan for her though in which Chelsea gets involved to help her out*gasps*. As for the Pokemon question, don't worry about it being random, you've read my notes, I'm generally worse. As for it, when I was younger, Pokemon was my favorite show and probably one of the first ever animes I'd ever watched, so I was obsessed with it. Anyway, so there was this Pokemon multi player type website and I wanted to join, my favorite pokemon was and is Eevee so I wanted to show that and in my mind Eevee was spelled either Eve or Evee. Almost all the Eveloves' were taken so I went with Eveelove and got it the first try. Realizing how uncommon that was, Eveelove just became my general go to username and has followed me here. Oh and by the way, it's Flareon, definitely Flareon, not only is it still really cute, but it's made of fire. I've always been a small pyro...but anyway, thanks or reviewing again, glad you liked the last chapter. (wow that was way too long...)**

**MY two new followers- OMG THANK YOU! Glad you've liked it so far!**

**Okay, there is one really small detail I'd like to point out. So Chelsea is 22 and her mom died when she was 14, Kalie is 14 now and her half sister. This was kind of a typo but at the same time not. See, I suck at math. I didn't mean for the ages to work like that so just imagine them to be at more appropriate ages and do not go thinking Toby is an adulterer and he had an affair or something, he's a lot of things but he's generally not disloyal(to his wife). If you haven't noticed that cool, ignore this whole thing and continue to put the two sisters in their proper age groups. Okay that's all I had to say from now on Chelsea is 26 and Kalie is 12 and Chelsea's mom died at that age. Okay done, sorry 'bout that. Still going to post every Saturday so see you then!**


	13. Witch Princess

**A/n I just found out that tomorrow I'm going to be gone for the weekend so I decided to update early. I apologize in advance for the chapter, I think I wrote it when I was mad but I'm not sure. It was a while back. Also, The name Maris can either mean "of the sea" or "star of the sea" I like the former but they both work. Also, when I was thinking about the meeting of Witch Princess and Chelsea I was thinking they're kind of similar in some ways and in that thinking, I was thinking I usually don't get along well with people who are a lot like me.(Which is probably why my mom and I always argue) So even in that right, I'd never planned for the first meeting between Chelsea and Witch Princess to go 'smooth', but I might have taken it a bit too far. If I can work it in though they should be friends by the end of the story(story, not chapter or the next several chapters either). As for the pulling characters out of the story...I'm REALLY lazy recently and don't really feel like doing it, so sorry for that. So without further delay, here's the early update of the next chapter of 'Try'!**

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**OMG, I AM SO SORRY! I SERIOUSLY THOUGHT I UPLOADED THIS! As you can see by the author's note I had made but didn't drop just now to prove a point, I really had planned to upload this earlier. Omg I am seriously so sorry for this...(T-T) To show my apologies, I'll immediately upload the next chapter, sorry...  
**

* * *

**Chelsea**

I woke up with the sun and my foot itched like crazy.

Its been two weeks since I cut my foot and I was starting to go insane.

Everyone on the island has visited me while I wasn't allowed on my foot and a bunch of people brought things to distract me from my boredom but it still wasn't enough. Once or twice Mark brought over his dog and left him with me while he did my work, but the boredom returned the minute Max left.

Even Vaughn made a surprise visit. He threw an old strategy game at me that you could play alone or with someone and that helped for an hour or so, until I got pissed at losing five times in a row and tossed it at the wall.

Taro came over and we dodged around a few names for my chicken. In the end we went for a somewhat ironic Maris.

But now, I was desperate to see Maris.

I peeled off the bandages and exposed the brown scabbing that was now just a very thin curve that even Jules could manage to look at without gagging. Doctor Trent came over to look at it and thankfully, he said I could walk on it today as long as I took care not to get it infected.

I wrapped it up in fresh bandages and slipped on my clothes. I stretched out my arms and back, and got ready for the day.

I just wrapped my bandana around my head when a knock on my door grabbed my attention. I slipped my tools quickly into my rucksack and answered it.

Mark stood there, happy as ever with an even happier Max. "Hey Chelsea! I kind of got hooked on your work so I was wondering if I could help out."

I looked out at my fields with an even greater amount of seed spots and weeds, stones and woods every three meters. I calculated the time it would take for me to do it alone and then did the same thing with Mark and I working together. Honestly, Mark could probably get it all done faster than I could, he's always had a talent for things like that. I sighed. I really wanted to bond with Maris.

"Sure, why not. But I full dibs on Maris."

Mark laughed. "No complaints here!"

I made a beeline towards the coop.

The minute I walked through the doors Maris rushed me.

Apparently, though our meeting was short, she remembers who saved her. I've never been happier to be recognized by anything in a wile. I cooed over Maris for as long as I dared and set out her feed. Once I put the feed down I decided to watch her.

She looked at me, then at the feed, then at me and then the feed again. Then after a bit she just sat down. Worried I did a thorough look over on her to see if anything was wrong. My search came up empty. I tsked.

I tried getting Maris to eat the feed using several tricks that even I wouldn't dare to do in public but still no luck. Worried, thinking something was wrong with the feed I picked up a handful of it to inspect it. The minute the food settled in my hand Maris raced towards me, jumped on my wrist and began to peck at the food in my hand. Stunned, I let her.

Once she pecked my hand completely clean she jumped off and looked back up at me. This time I knew exactly what she was trying to get at.

"You spoiled chick!" I laughed.

I set Maris down gently on the ground and put as much of the left over feed in both of my hands cupped together and tilted it towards Maris. She cleaned out the food faster than I've ever seen even a dog do. I laughed again.

"You and I are a match made in farmer heaven!" I say jokingly.

Maris clucks agreeance and I swear I saw a heart above her head.

I shook the notion off with a smile.

As I got up to leave Maris tried to follow me out. I turned around and shook my finger at her.

"Absolutely not. It's way too cold out there for a small chick like you. Grow a lot bigger and healthier and I might consider it."

She sits in reply.

I grin and leave without a trail.

I look at the field and about half of the crops have been watered and all the plants needing harvesting have been harvested.

"What do you think?" Mark asks, wiping his gloved hands off on his pants.

"That I should hire you as a farm hand and hole up in a barnful of animals."  
Mark smiled. "I take that as a compliment."  
"Good, cause I meant it as one" I laugh.  
I chance a glimpse at Max and an idea strikes me.  
"Hey Mark can I borrow Max for a while?"  
He furrows his brows. "Sure, but he's your dog. It's not like I'd get the chance the stop you if you took him."  
I stared at Mark, dumbstruck by his stupidity.  
"What?" He asks.  
I shake my head and let loose a shrill whistle. Max comes bounding over in reply. I pat him on the head in reward.  
"Now Max, go to your master." I command loud enough for Mark to hear.  
In immediate reply Max trots over to Mark's side. He stares down at him dumbstruck.  
"I didn't give you Max because I thought you could take care of him best. I gave him to you because he'd already picked you, idiot" I say knocking him in the head for good measure.  
"He hasn't been my dog in 3 years. I just needed a good excuse to give him to you."  
Mark looks down at Max and suddenly tackles him in what settled into a hug. Max yelped his surprise.  
"Easy Einstein, He will bite in self-defense you know."  
"Right." Mark says shakily. I couldn't help it, a small smile crept on my face. It was always a warming sight when I saw someone get along with an animal like this. But I had plans.  
"Right well, I'm taking your dog for now, I'll be back by sundown hopefully."  
"Hopefully?"  
"I'm going to the forest, and if I find something interesting I will investigate."  
Mark shakes his head and grins, "You know I might actually start charging you for my services. "  
I laugh, "Right, so much for family then."  
"Bloods thicker than water but moneys thicker than blood."  
"Greedy little brat aren't you?"  
Mark rubs his fingers together to demonstrate money. I roll my eyes.  
"Bye-bye greedy."  
"See ya stingy!" Mark waves.  
I snort.  
As I leave the ranch with Max at my heels I spot a black stetson leaving Mirabelle's shop.  
"Vaughn!"  
He turns around and I wave him over. His response, to my surprise, was to flip me off.  
I watched him head toward the beach with my mouth gaping.  
"What. The. Hell?" I growl.  
Max mimics in kind. I look at him and smile a wicked grin.  
"Lets go beat a cowboy shall we?"  
Max and I race down to the beach and immediately spot his black clad figure sticking out startlingly from the white sand. He was the only one on the beach, to bad for him. I race toward him and tackle him to the ground, Max steals his chance and nabs one of his boots.  
"Chelsea!" Vaughn yells.  
He moves to shove me off him and I accidentally slam a knee in his gut.  
He cripples inward. Uh, oh.  
"Uh, oops." I say backing the hell off.  
Remember that conversation Natalie and I had about southern city slickers and their pocket knives? Let's just say I was a little paranoid about being right.  
After groaning and using some very colorful language of the like even I haven't used often, Vaughn slowly got up cussing and swearing still for good measure. Then he glared at me.  
Instinctively I raise my arms in defense, "Sorry! Sorry! REEAALLY SORRY! Don't kill me!" I plead.  
At the word kill Max drops Vaughn's boot, looks around and growls unsure. Evidently he and I didn't share the same viewpoints on who would or would not pose a danger to you when mad.  
Vaughn glares at me for a bit longer and then ,as if giving up, sighs.  
" I probably had part of that coming."  
That perked my interest. Somehow I've never expected Vaughn to be the type to admit to his mistakes.  
Unsure I lower my arms, "So, we're okay?"  
Vaughn nods.  
"I just shoved a knee into your gut and your okay with that?"  
"Did you do it on purpose?"  
"No! Absolutely not! I swear!" I cry out.  
"Then it's fine."  
Now call me crazy, but I was getting a little worried now.  
"Vaughn? Are you okay?" I ask.  
He nods again.  
I fidget nervously. "Uh...I was going to explore the forest for Gabe, do you want to come?"  
Vaughn tugs his hat and shrugs agreeance.  
"um...okay..." I say unsure.I really don't think I've ever been so confused by a person before in my life.  
I walked towards the forest, too scared to look behind me to see if he was following. Yet the minute I cleared the bridge and entered the forest, I didn't care much for anything else besides the forest itself.  
I take a deep,happy breath, feeling oddly comforted and at home in my leafy,nature noisy surroundings. A twig snapped confirming for me that Vaughn had indeed followed me. I turned around and smiled at him, happy and at ease in ways I can only be in places like here. Vaughn tugs on his hat.  
A soft pink licking his ears showed me why. Delightfully shocked, I laugh.  
As if to break the silence, which I found a little odd for the naturally silent Vaughn, he spoke, "So how are we going to find your dog?"  
I grinned. "It's actually really easy now that I have Max here. I can train a dog to do anything physically possible for them on command remember?"  
I slipped off my bandana, hoping Gabe's smell hadn't worn off yet from when I switched our bandana's on the boat.  
"Find." I command.  
In immediate response Max bounds off into the woods. I chase after him.  
I zipped through the trees with branches swirling through my hair and roots off the trees try to trip me up every few feet. Most people found things like this disorientating, intimidating, scary almost. I found it familiar. Max stopped and ran at different intervals to help me keep up. I huffed at him when he waited a particularly long time at the end of a series of bushes. I vault over them cleanly and landed smugly in front of Max. He let out a short bark and took off again. As the trees began to part foreshadowing a nearby clearing Max began to act up.  
He turned back at me and let out a low growl.  
"Max?" I ask, hands raised defensively yet calming.  
The bushes by Max rustled and parted. There standing before me was Gabe. He was in desperate need of a grooming bath combo and his bandana was frayed beyond everything, but he was otherwise fine.  
"Gabe!" I scream out.  
He growls low and threatening.  
"Gabe?"  
A branch snaps and Vaughn's there beside me.  
He looks at Max and Gabe and looks back at me.  
"What happened?"  
I shook my head as tears start pricking together at my eyes. I thought I'd imagined every scenario that could happen between Gabe and me when we saw each other. Obviously, I hadn't.  
I took a step forward and his growls got louder.  
Usually if a dog growled at me I'd stop, look at them, then walk away, thinking they just needed some space. This wasn't usual.  
I raced forward, restrained Gabe in a hug and buried my head at his neck where his teeth couldn't go.  
"Gabe!" I cry.  
Slowly his growls faded, I felt him loose up against my touch and then he started giving his pity whine. I put him down, looked into his face then hugged him again, relieved. He licked my cheek as if in apology.  
"What are you doing here?" A blonde with a red eyes and a head full of curls that went to her back asked.  
I stared at her. She was wearing a purple native american looking dress, had a satchel at her hip and wore a black cloak with a skull pin used for a clasp. She also had an atmosphere that would make even the most foolish of strong men stop before approaching her. I'm not a foolish man. I'm a foolish girl.  
I said the first word that came to mind. "Witch."  
A vein popped in the side of her head. "Witch princess." She huffed correction.  
I held up Gabe and looked her in the eye. "Were you responsible for him?"  
She laughed in scorn. "Of course it's a simple matter to enchant a dog to guard. After all, that's partly what they were bred for."  
I put Gabe down on the ground and he looked at me sad and knowing. I stood straight up, walked over to the Witch Princess and slapped her clean across the face. Her face jolts to the side in recoil. Immediate results showed as a red streak began to form on everywhere I landed on. She reached up and lightly touched her face looking up at me, wide-eyed.  
"I don't give two cents shit what the hell you are. If you ever treat an animal like some type of object, to do nothing but simple commands, and force them to go against their will like this, I will rip you piece to piece, get on a boat and throw those pieces off the side of the boat in the middle of the ocean. " She stared stun with her hand to her cheek. I glared at her. "Are we clear?"  
She shook slightly but managed to, for the most part pass it off as anger. " What's a mere human going to do to me? I'm a witch! I could kill you now!" Then as if to prove it she brought out a raccoon from the brush. As it scurried out I glimpsed six small eyes stare from the brush. When the raccoon came near her she kicked it hard into the air and it slammed into a tree. As it made contact I heard a snap. I knew it wasn't anything on the tree that made that noise. Then a I heard second snap no one else but me could hear.  
I cleared any distance between us faster than she could react to me, I grabbed at her hair bent her down and slammed my knee deliberately into her gut. She tried to pull herself back up and retaliate but before she could I was crashing my knee into her again, knocking out any wind she could use effectively for at least five minutes.

Five minutes were enough to kill someone in a fight. She fell to the ground and I wailed on her aiming for her face. Slowly a veil of blood begins to shade my fists. At one point she started crying in wails but I was too worked up to stop.

"Chelsea." Vaughn called in what seemed a distant land.  
I ignored him.  
"Chelsea! Stop!"  
This time I heard him even less.  
All of a sudden I got a slight sensation of flying and realized Vaughn had just pulled me off the Witch Princess by my arms, straight into the air, and positioned me in a way where I was completely reliant on Vaughn to keep me in a few seconds. I hissed out frustration. I was never one who liked backing down when mad before I impaled full damage in either a physical or emotional way. A fact that someone is definite to suffer from one day.  
"Chelsea, you were going to kill her." Vaughn states, shocked.  
"Oh? Like she just killed the raccoon?" I hiss.  
I heard a soft rustle and instinctively knew it was him shaking his head.  
"Ever heard the saying an eye for an eye makes the whole world blind?"  
"Like you listen to crap like that."  
He nodded. "You're right, but at least I'm aware that humans are classified as animals and you stated that your mom loved them all."

At that, all hatred left my body if only for an instant. I'm not stupid, I knew he was right. It was enough for me to calm down. It was then that I realized that the Witch Princess was sobbing in pain. I cringed from the impact of the guilt I felt. Then blanched when I realized I had wanted to continue just seconds before. I looked over at Max and Gabe who were cowering together in fear from me. Even the baby raccoons who saw who killed their parent were more scared of me than her, one even sniffed her curiously.

The whole scene was so horrifying to me that I almost went into hysterical laughter at the amount of damage I could cause. This time, I counted myself lucky that instead of that, I crippled and cried.

Gabe jumped forward and nuzzled his head to my face. It helped a little. After I essentially bawled my eyes out, I felt that if I regretted doing something, I should do my best to fix it. Something I could probably trace back to my mom with.

I got up, brushed off my pants and went over to Witch Princess. She'd apparently passed out which not only made me feel worse, it also made me worried. Unlike what people normally think, if someone passes out their life very well could, would,should or was at stake.

From a first glance I knew I'd broken her nose with blood coming from both nostrils and it crooked to the left. I'd also felt it was a safe assumption to say I'd broken one of her ribs as well by her strained sobbing breaths. She must have cut her mouth as well considering there was blood dripping from it.

I'd checked her pulse to make sure there wasn't irregularities to it, and for the most part it was fine. I checked her back and neck just to be safe and fortunately they were also fine. I gently pulled open her eyelids to be sure they weren't dilated, which could mean a concussion, and despite the odds, they were fine as well.

I gave a sigh of relief.

I wanted to move her but prior knowledge made me aware of how dangerous that could be with a broken rib. If I wasn't extremely careful I could puncture an internal organ, it would be even easier to do so considering she couldn't really tell me to stop because it hurt while she's passed out.

"Vaughn can you get a cot or something? Something that would be strong enough to hold a person without moving them much."

Vaughn nods then leaves.

Hoping to find a house or something, I get up and walk towards the clearing. Thankfully, there indeed was a house. In fact, it was one I recognized when I was up at the cliff. The one Natalie said was a witches house the first day I was here.

It had a huge curled tree looking thing with a glowing orb twisted over framing it and separating a dark pink roof from dark wooden walls.

To be safe I checked to see if the door was locked. Thankfully, it wasn't.

I went in thinking I could get a few first-aid things but was stopped by the sight of at least 21 huge teddy bears staring at me from both sides of the room and one giant teddy bear staring me down front and center.

Staring past the middle bear I realized he was almost like a room divider where one side of the room looked like a scholars room with books about all sorts of things piled up from the floor to the ceiling on a wooden bookcase. On the other side of the room there were large quantities of glass vials and pots of assorted shapes in sizes filled with liquids of different colors and densities, gases of varying visibility and colors, and solids in shapes that I did NOT want to guess at.

Curious I walked past the teddy bear sentries and went over the glass vials. I picked several up examined them and then placed them approximately back in their spots. While I was about to put one back I accidentally knocked off a jar that looked like it was filled with a green liquid and small eyeballs. I winced, expecting a loud crash and then-I heard nothing.

I opened my eyes and looked at the floor. Right where there should have been glass shards coated in goo was nothing, but a bit above that spot was the still intact jar.

I stared in awe as the jar floated, then slowly, it lifted itself up and put itself back on the shelf.

I stood there, mind blown, then slowly, I backed out of the house and closed the door.

"That, was cool and creepy in ways I didn't even know existed." I said to myself.

Feeling like there would be nothing of help that I knew of in the house I walked back to where the Witch Princess still lied in the woods.

It didn't take long till Vaughn was there with an actual stretcher.

I raised an eyebrow at that.

"You'd be surprised how often we used it too." He responds.

Honestly, I don't want to know so I shook it off. "I don't think anything will surprise me anymore Vaughn."

"Do I want ta know?"

"No." was my simple answer.

He rolled his eyes.

I crouched down and place one of my hands under her upper back and the other supporting her head. I motioned with my head to Vaughn and he placed the stretcher right next her on the ground and put his hands under her butt and at the crook of her knee.

I counted to three and we quickly and carefully, placed her on the stretcher.

"So where she going?"

I smiled. "To a magical, strange place, just follow me."

We lifted both ends of the stretcher and walked back to the clearing. When we reached her house a clear look of bafflement crossed his face.

I grinned, "Oh you haven't seen nothing." Then I reached for the door.

* * *

**Recently I'm currently cursing the name of one of my friends for introducing me to _Homestuck. _Why? Because the last three nights I stayed up WAY past what I should have doing Homestuck related things, and I'm bad enough in the mornings, the mornings I don't get enough sleep? I'm a downright bitch. Then I feel awful later on and am like, essentially just groveling to my friends begging them not to not take it personally and shit like that. But _ugh _I'm seriously just barely going to get enough sleep this weekend oh well, I'll have fun (she says hopefully). Also I'm no longer failing one of my best classes! Turns out, homework is REALLY important and slacking a bit is bad. So I got my science grade up to a C- from a legit 38% E so that's pretty impressive but I'm hoping to get it higher before the end of the marking period (*cough* next week*cough*) but I'm not really expecting much. I'll probably just kick it high gear next marking period and average in a B+ anyway. Okay so enough personal, onto the thank! **

**Mryhh- Don't worry about the re-types, I understand and it doesn't bother me in the first place(unless you had like 20 of them then I would just be going WHAT THE HELL?! At my computer probably thinking it was all Fanfiction's fault.) Anyway, don't worry about any of the characters, the ones who deserve it are all paired up and planned out (for the most part) already, nothing about anyone not mentioned has been written down much, but it's at least planned out. And there's nothing wrong with being a little emotional. The order of the Eevee evolutions from my favorites actually goes like this: Flareon, Vaporeon, then it's kind of tied between Umbreon and Glaceon, then it's Espeon then Leafeon then in dead last is Jolteon. I don't like Jolteon solely because it's yellow and that color is EVIL to my eyes and head, no seriously looking at it gives me headaches and makes my eyes hurt, kind of liking staring at the snow on a sunny day when you've been inside all day. As for the power issue, a lot of the times the general power levels don't really matter as long as you put enough time in so I don't really worry too much about that when dealing with pokemon. I mean hey, Raichu is generally stronger than Pikachu but you don't see Ash in a hurry to go evolving him, but I've always been the sentimental type who doesn't worry about the cost but the thought behind things so that's only expected I guess. Anyway, thanks for reviewing again!**

**Fairy-San- Sorry, I had updated just before you reviewed so I didn't get to you Monday(?) but thanks for reviewing again. **

**I feel awful, I forgot to thank the silent followers last week, the ones who I never hear from but always come back and read my latest chapter. Thank you everyone! **

**Okay, let's see, did I have anything else to say about the story? Um...OH YEAH! The Easter Special? I think I might hold off on that until like next year because I didn't get it done in time, so sorry for that, I'm actually kind of depressed about it but that's what you get when you're too lazy to work through writers block... Okay, I think, that's all I had to say. Thanks for reading again!**


	14. Vaughn's view

**A/n I am so sorry for *almost* forgetting to post today. I'll give you one guess as to what distracted me though(homestuck,homestuck,homestuck). In the first part Vaughn acts really really...well, you'll see, and then the second part is kind of like a pimp slap saying "forgot about me didn't ya" which is a nice way to say I really wanted to find a way to change this whole thing around in many ways. Vaughn is usually a very fun character to write for but I was laboring through this chapter after a point. I almost did the same thing later on but I just went 'no, screw this' and scraped everything related to that so it should be *MOSTLY* smooth throughout the rest of the story, just so long as I stay away from a keyboard when irritated and/or mad. Well, whatever, enjoy 'Try'  
**

* * *

**Vaughn**

Despite everything I'd been trying to do all morning to do so, I couldn't get Chelsea's story out of my head. What Mark said made some sense in a lot of ways but I still felt like there was something missing from it. Something not even he knew.

The thoughts had been rolling through my head so much that I started seeing Chelsea based hallucinations. I thought anything red was a bandana. I thought Julia's girlish giggles was Chelsea's taunting laughs. Every time one of the chicks stirred even a little I thought Chelsea was off in the corner sleeping again. I'd even begun turning every bumb, thump, creak or whine that the barn made into Chelsea walking on the roof or Chelsea jumping off or over something, Chelsea coming through a door or Chelsea shifting something over. I was going mad.

I kept telling myself that there wasn't a way she'd be in Mirabelle's barn, but no matter how I reasoned it out, the minute something reminded me of Chelsea, or when ever I had a mindless menial thing to do, my thoughts turned to figuring out Chelsea. Because of all my trying to keep myself totally sane I'd managed to work myself up into a pretty bad mood.

After a particularly spacey moment of thinking of what could've been missing from her story a cow, frightened slightly by a stray chicken that shouldn't have been in here, backed onto my foot. Cussin' like a sailor I decided that there were probably better places than a barn to have deep thoughts. Soft places with soothing sounds, like the beach. Coming to this conclusion and leaving Mirabelle's shop, that's when I saw her.

She was walking joyfully off her property with Max in tow.

The fact that she could be up but wasn't working, and that my foot was still smarting and I couldn't work, just set off my bad mood even worse.

She waved happily over at me and promptly I flipped her off and walked away.

I'd walked down to the beach and was just getting adjusted to the view when all of a sudden I was tackled. In the collision, I just barely noticed my boot being taken off.

I turned around ready to take down my unknown assailant when I spotted a red bandana. Inwardly I groaned.

Chelsea. Of course.

"Chelsea!" I yell out at her pissed as hell.

I push her and a knee goes right into my midriff.

Instinctively, I ball up.

Chelsea practically jumps off when she realizes what'd she'd just done.

"Uh...opps." She says fearfully.

I look at her and she's shaking. Briefly in my lack of oxygen induced calm, I wonder why, then the pains hits me and involuntarily, I cuss up a storm.

I rise slowly, now swearing just as a release of anger and look directly at Chelsea.

"Sorry! Sorry! REEAALLY SORRY! Please don't kill me!" She pleads raising her arms to cover her face. I realize that I must have been glaring at her and sigh. I hear a dull thud and realize Max dropped my boot.

'so he's the twerp who took it' I think to myself, almost smiling.

" I probably had part of that coming." I say considerably in a better mood now that I couldn't think.

Her eyes widen in surprise and she cautiously lowers her arms.

"So we're okay?" She's asks.

I nod.

"I just shoved a knee in your gut and you're okay with that?"

I narrow my eyes now, slightly worried.

"Did you do it on purpose?"

"No! Absolutely Not! I swear!"

I nod my head. "Then it's okay."

She searches my face, confusion clear across her face.

"Vaughn, are you okay?"

'_Oh I'm perfectly fine. It's just that Mark told me about your mom and dog and that it feels like somethings missing from it all and that something is driving me insane with curiosity and I've had it on my mind all day and didn't even completely do my job right so it kind of pissed me off._' Is what I'm never in a million years going to say and, I probably couldn't trust my voice not to hint it. So I just answer with a nod.

Chelsea fidgets, still unsure.

'_rather than a child, she's starting to remind me of a prideful animal, like a cat, lion or wolf_.'

"Um...I was about to go into the forest to look for Gabe, do you want to come?" She asks nervously.

The idea that Chelsea was willingly asking someone to go with her on something that at this point seemed so much like a private and very personal thing, now knowing what I do about Chelsea, I was shocked.

I tugged on my hat, a dead give away habit for so many things that the fact that it's still a habit irks me, and almost do a shrug nod type move.

'Um...Okay." Chelsea says, almost seeming dejected.

"Shit" I swear under my breath at the realization. Max perks his ears, and looks back at me with searching eyes, somehow the motion seemed to have so many different meanings behind it with what I've seen from him already, I almost became embarrassed. And in that fact, in the end, it did make me embarrassed.

I followed Chelsea, always a few steps behind, over the wooden bridge on the river and to the islands only foresty area. I look at her in a watchful eye looking for any sign of her freaking out from some unforeseen trauma. Instead what I saw was Chelsea relax in a way that I've only seen her do once in Mirabelle's coop surrounded by chickens. Chelsea being so relaxed, so unguarded struck me in a way I couldn't place. As if being pulled, I took a step closer to her and a pop that to me sounded like a gun blast in the moment came from under my foot.

I look at Chelsea to see if she's still as unguarded as she was before. I look at her eyes and what I saw was so different from the normal Chelsea I was amazed. And then she smiled. Her smile is what convinced me she could train any animal to do anything, or rather it was a smile that in old days warriors might go willingly to war for. It was a smile that was warm and kind. A smile you'd want to protect. A smile I wanted to see more often.

She was still staring at me when I had that thought and I felt almost like she could read minds, even if that was impossible, it embarrassed me. It embarrassed me to such a degree I swear I could feel myself turning red. I pulled down my stetson in defense.

She laughs a laugh that reminds me of small bells and sweet lullabies. It was too much for me to take in right now. So I spoke to break the moment.

"So how are we going to find your dog?"

She grins her Chelsea grin and I relax. "It's actually really easy now that I have Max here. I can train a dog to do anything physically possible for them on command remember?"

That perked my interest and I was extremely curious as to what she had planned. She slipped off her bandana and I noticed that though I expected it to be messy and dull underneath it, her hair was actually silky looking and sleek.

"Find" I hear Chelsea command Max.  
Then without warning Max zips through the forest like a furry bullet, almost just as fast Chelsea follows. Hopelessly, I try and keep up. At one point I lost her and relied on her footprints in the moist soil to point out her location.

When I finally catch up to her both Max and a beagle with a tattered bandana that could only be Gabe were growling at her. Quite honestly, she looked like a person who was either about to commit suicide or kill everyone.

"What happened?" I asked worried.

She dove for Gabe crying out his name, I watched stunned as the same dog I was thinking went feral calmed under her hand. Suddenly a wicked looking women came stomping through the trees. "What are you doing here?" She asked.

Chelsea gaped at her a while, then she just uttered a word. "Witch."

The women scrunched up her nose. "Witch Princess." She clarified.

Chelsea looked pissed compared to a few seconds ago. She lifts up Gabe and spits out. "Were you responsible for him?"

A look from the Witch Princess would have answered her question and almost immediately a small feeling of dread was glooming.

"It's a small thing to enchant a dog to guard, after all it's in their nature."

Chelsea marched quickly over to her and slapped her clean across the face. The Witch Princess stared at her shocked.

"I don't give two cents shit what the hell you are. If you ever treat an animal like some type of object, to do nothing but simple commands, and force them to go against their will like this, I will rip you piece to piece, get on a boat and throw those pieces off the side of the boat in the middle of the ocean." She pauses, allowing her glare to sink in deeper terrifying everyone. "Are we clear?"

The Witch Princess shakes in fear but steeling her voice replies, " What's a mere human going to do to me? I'm a witch! I could kill you now!"

A raccoon waltzes out of the brush and as soon as it approaches her she punts it into a tree. I've never wanted to strike a girl so much but before I could do anything stupid, Chelsea does so for me.

In an amount a speed expected more of animals than humans she surges forward and brings Witch Princess down onto her knee. I cringe at the memory of what that did on accident to me. Witch Princess moves up as if to do something but before she could Chelsea slams her back down on her knee. From their it was a sheep to the slaughterer. I called out to her to get her to stop but she barely responds. I call again and it was like I didn't exist. Slowly I began to simmer in irritation before I forced myself to calm down.

Knowing how easy it is to deal life threatening damage, I knew I had to stop her. I step forward and lace my arms underneath hers and pull her up and off the Witch Princess. She struggles a bit so in caution I step back and out of range without letting her go. She almost roared in frustration, something that in a movie would have made me snicker a little but right now I was finding out was kind of disorientating.

"Chelsea! You were going to kill her!" I warn her off. She just smirks in a way that sent chills down my spin.

"Like she killed the raccoon?" She says cold.

With this, I realize how true it was that she didn't value humans in the same way she did animals. "Ever heard an eye for an eye makes the whole world blind?" I asks hopefully.

"Like you believe that bullcrap." I rolled my eyes at that. She was right about that, but now wasn't the time to agree. I scramble my brain for something that would calm her down.

"At least I know humans are classified as animals and you stated your mom loved all animals." I say surprising myself a little.

What surprises me more is how quickly that left my mouth she relaxed into my arms. I look closely at her and her faces just begins to pale. Feeling as if restraining her would be dangerous right now I slowly settle her down on the ground. She looks around then just falls forward and cries. Taken back I just rest my hand on her back, Gabe, seemingly out of nowhere, appears and licks her face. She clutches at him as if he was a life raft in a stormy sea. Soon she settles down and looks up again.

Her gaze settles on the Witch Princess and I almost brace myself for her to go insane again. Instead she does a complete diagnosis over her. She seemed so sure of what she was doing, briefly I wondered where'd she learned it from.

"Vaughn, can you get a caught or something?" She asks.

I nod my head and leave without question.

The look Mirabelle gave me when I asked for the stretcher we use to move injured sheep and the like questioned me in ways I knew she wouldn't put into to words. She finds it quickly and hands it over. "Be careful." She says.

It took me back a little to be honest, but I nodded my head anyway.

I rush back to the forest where Witch Princess was and saw Chelsea feeling her forehead looking oddly confused. She sees me with the stretcher and raises one of her eyebrows.

I snicker. "You'd be surprised how often we use it too."

She just shakes her head with a small smile and says, " I don't think anything will surprise me anymore Vaughn."

"Do I want to know?"

"No." She says.

I roll my eyes. I should of saw that coming really.

I set the stretcher down and she grabs the upper half of Witch Princess. With a motion of her head she signals me to grab the other half. She counts quickly to three and we lift and settle the Witch Princess onto the stretcher.

As if in synch, we both lift up the stretcher and I follow her.

"So where she going" I ask lightly.

"To a magical, special place." She says, smiling at an unvoiced joke.

We move through the clearing ahead and I'm met by a medium sized wood house with a pink roof and a weird tree with a glowing orb on it. Chelsea smirks. "You haven't seen nothing yet."

* * *

**You know that feeling where you think something was a good idea and then later on you're just thinking to yourself 'was I high?' yeah, that's the last two chapter. I'd post another chapter in apology but thanks to an unknown webcomic (homestuck,homestuck,homestuck) taking up my time I'm rapidly catching up. Luckily, it's probably only a couple of chapters and then try's done and I decided that instead of drawing it out to the point where I hate my own story I'll just cut it in half and give try a sequel so I can give myself a decent break. Right now, I never felt like I could use one more. My to do list currently includes up with Homestuck 2. Read the Naruto manga(I've only watched it so far) 3. Finish Try 4. Deal with a large amount of church related things 5. Try very very hard not to fail my 6 hour geometry(homework go away, far away) 6. Bring up my science grade (math, why are you involved in graphing?) 7. Make it so my friends don't feel like I'm totally blowing them off, which sadly, I kind of have recently. 8. Start up preparing for a garden 9. Read the Fairy Tail manga(similar thing to 2.) 10. Sleep. Last three weeks I've been sorely lacking in sleep, so now, my attention span is shot, my interests in things is at an all time low driving me insane in boredom, and I fall asleep at the drop of a hat, it's freakin terror. 11. Get my stupid license. 12. Look into getting a job*groans* 13. Take care of my dog so my mom can quit complaining and threatening to give him away. What's worse is even though everything there I'm already struggling to fit in, my parents and people around me go and throw another thing into the works. It drives me insane. Well, that was me and my complaints, sorry. Anyway, I can't really remember if anything new has happened(another side effect of no sleep) so I'm just going to throw out a general 'thank you!' to everyone. Now, lets see if I can't knock one of those things off the to do list...  
**


	15. Witch House

**A/n So tomorrow there's yet *another* thing that popped up on me this week that I have to do and Friday there's this church sleep over for younger girls that I have to help out with so you guys get an early update. Which, though it sounds good is really going to be bad longer down the road because it's only two more chapters and you guys are completely up to date with what I've done. Chelsea is just being Chelsea and Vaughn is just being a, you know, NORMAL anti-social human being who never believed in magic. Well, sorry that's it's short and kind of filler-ish, hope you enjoy anyway!  
**

* * *

Never in all of my life have I been more confused,shocked and surprised by what I saw in this wooden house. I was surrounded by teddy bears. But even more surprising than large teddy bears surrounding me was what was past them. It looked like what'd you get when you tell an avid scholar and a witchy herbalist to share a room. They'd split it down the middle and each side would be like a whole new room. On one side of the large room there were books cluttered everywhere, a large amount of books were cluttered on the floor, some being propped up by teddy bears as if they're reading them. The neat freak in me twitched to clean the place up. What wasn't on the floors was occupying a massive book shelf from floor to ceiling. Quickly I wondered how'd the owner even manage to get it into this house.

On the other side of the room was the avid herbalist's domain. Glasses vases, pots, vials and jars lined the shelves each of their own varying sizes and shapes, each with their own separate substance. A massive shiny cauldron nestled into the corner of the room set off the room and let you know it didn't belong to an ordinary person.

A movement in my peripheral vision caught my eyes and I was even more taken aback by a life-sized teddy bear coming my way. He reached for Witch Princess and Chelsea swatted his hand away as if he was a child.

The teddy bear roars in her face revealing a set of teeth that weren't very fluffy. She just stared at him then bopped him on the head. "You'll just do more harm than good now go sit back down." she commands.

Amazed, I watched as it did just that, sitting right in the middle of the room. Chelsea nodded her head in approval like this was all a normal thing. She moved us over to the bed at the wall and set the Witch Princess down on the bed. Then she turned back to the bear. "Do you have a first-aid kit?" she asks.

'She just asked a teddy bear a question...Where am I? No way am I still on Earth.'

The bear gets up, walks over to the bed and crawls under it. After a moment of shuffling he pulled out a fairly large first-aid kit and handed it to Chelsea, she nodded her thanks and got to work. After a series of disinfecting wounds, placing ice on certain spots and fixing Witch Princess's nose,Chelsea seemed satisfied that she'd done everything she could.

"So what now?" I asked her.

She sighs. "I think I should go home."

"Why is that?" I ask shocked.

"'cause there's nothing left for me to do. Plus, she might wake up pissed," Chelsea points to Witch Princess and gives a worn smile "and start expecting things that'll make me pissed."

I rolled my eyes. "Why do I get the feeling you're just avoiding this whole thing?"

She smirks with sad look then looks me in the eye. "You're learning yet cowboy."

I couldn't say anything as she left.

* * *

**YES! I'm up to date with reading Homestuck so that's currently off my list of things to do and no longer terrorizing my personal life. (still terrorizing my mentality though since it's not finished yet.) And thanks to that I'm catching up on sleep as well so I'm in a much better mood as well. X3 AND I caught up in my math homework (soft of) in 6th hour so my grades up to a C+(Thank God I'm not failing. Let's thank the nice teacher for allowing late work.) As for my science grade, well, I'll see soon enough if great test scores can average low homework grades.(I lose all my homework or completely forget about it, please don't take after me in this it's very stressful) It's been raining too much to do any real gardening and I've got the plants all growing inside so it's just water them when I get home then ignore them for a day or two depending on how fast they dry out. So now I just have to do homework and not lose it and I have nothing to worry about really in school. I've been void of energy lately but I can stay awake which is good and if I'm not being distracted by interesting things like books or friends and then getting lost focusing is easy. My memory is still crap but I think that's from the headaches I've got from allergies. Manga reading has barely progressed but there isn't any major rush on those so I can put them off for a bit thankfully. Now if can just sit down for 2 to 3 hours and write straight out a few chapters I wouldn't even have to stress over 'Try'. Oh and if you can't figure it out, I am ADHD but it's usually not bad as long as get sleep...which I haven't. But I'm getting a little better and tomorrow I have no school so I can get a few more things done. But man I need to work on time management...**

**Harvest Moon 363- I'm glad you enjoyed the last chapter! I was a little paranoid about it due to the fact that I just wrote it out then walked away never to really read it too well until the day I was editing it for update. And I'm glad you reviewed, it motivated me to work a bit on the story and I managed to work past the writers wall I built for myself. (which takes me a while considering I like to ignore things that include large sums of concentration and work)**

**Rene de' Llu- GLAD YOU LIKE IT!**

**Mryhh- Glad you're concerned for me! However, you shouldn't worry too much, I'm really irresponsible so I tend to back myself into busy schedules so I'm kind of used to it as long as I can get some sleep in. As for studying that's something I generally don't do, don't really know how to do and don't usually need to do. My problem lies in getting my homework done and then managing to get it to school the next day. The reason I have a problem with getting math homework done even though it's easy enough is because when I see a page full of numbers a small part of me just wants to give up and leave it be. Not a good trait. As for my friends they're pretty understanding when I blow them off which is actually WHY I feel about it. So I just do my best not to do it and find small ways to fit them in one way or another. As for Vaughn, it's not that he's weak, it's just that Chelsea is a girl who can generally kick butt. I'll figure out a way to show it though, hopefully a non-violent way. Anyway don't worry about offending me in any way when you give me suggestions, I really appreciate them because they help give the story a more rounded feel, help me grow as a writer and can usually help motivate me into writing again. So if you have an idea, complaint or suggestion go ahead and let me hear it! :)  
**

**Alright, I'll be heading off to bed now because tomorrow I have to go clothes shopping *groans*. Stupid clothes, why can't you last years... And then I have to get a badly needed hair cut. Hopefully I can avoid my dad taking me because if he has his way he'll make me go super short to like, just below my ears or something. And with curly hair, I shudder to think about how that would look. Well, I might just finish that chapter on 'Try' I've been working on but after that I'm off to bed guaranteed. **


	16. Big (un)Happy Family Reunion

**A/N**

***stares at you for a long time then crashes head against the laptop* This week sucks. There is no real reason for it, other than it's hot, but I'm glad for the weekend. Well, at this point I'm not sure if this is speeding up to the end or making me write more shit than I intentionally planed to write. Two chapters from now is. so. freaking. LOOONNNGGG. But you know what? I'm okay with that. Rather, it's surprisingly fun to write right now, which it shouldn't be, but hey, it gives me a little motivation. School's almost out and that makes me a little worried about how it's going to affect Try's update time. I can guarantee it will be irregular though. Anyway, enjoy Try!  
**

* * *

**Chelsea**

A thick bead of sweat dripped into my eyes. I swore.

"It's too hot!" I complained.

Mark looked over at me. "Chelsea it's only like, 74 degrees out. What are you going to do during summer?"

"Die." I groaned thinking of the future.

He snickered. "It won't be that bad."

"It'll be that bad and probably worse."

He shook his head. "Quit complaining and start working. Those stones won't break themselves."

Yesterday there was a horrible storm. After I went out to feed Maris and came back, effectively getting hit by debris all the way, I decided I will never ever doubt Taro when he says prepare for a horrible storm and stay inside. It was so bad I was expecting to see a hurricane honestly.

The aftermath wasn't pretty either. Most of the crops, despite all logical odds, managed to survive, but everything around them was a mess. Too much a mess for just Mark to handle it at least.

"Ugh!" I groaned. "I hate this damn weather!"

"Chelsea. Hands. Move." Mark warned me to work.

I stuck my tongue out at him. "You know as long as you're working that's not going to bother me." He stated.

I huffed. "Screw you."

After that only the sound of splitting wood and breaking stones was heard as we worked on in silence. That is, until Gabe went nuts starting to bark like crazy.

"The hell?" I looked over at what he was barking at and my body went cold.

Standing at the entrance of my ranch hiding behind the man who raised me, was my worst nightmare. Selena was here with my dad.

Mark looked at my face then to where I was looking. He froze just as fast.

Selena looked over at us and pointed. I bolted.

I raced through the trees. The branches all seemed to work for Selena as they reached out and pulled through my hair and slapped across my skin, but I ignored them.

'Get away! Have to get away!' I screamed in my head.

I fell countless times but eventually I managed to clear past the trees and go around to the back of Mirabelle's. Without thinking anything through, I scrambled through an open window and effectively scared Julia to death. I grabbed her shoulders. "Hide me!"

She stared at me in shock. "What?"

I yelled in her face. "Hide me!"

A knock on the front door scared me even worse. "Please!" I begged in a hushed voice eyes twitching towards the door.

"Chelsea what's going on?" She asked confused.

"There's no time!" I choked out. "Just please! Hide me!"

Baffled, she nodded and pointed towards the hallway. "There's a storage closet that has a concealed door. It's three doors down to the left."

I nodded and raced towards the door bumping into Vaughn who was leaving one of the rooms.

"The hell?" He asked.

I turned to him and shushed him, then ran into the closet.

It was a large storage closet, the type you'd expect a janitor to have, and the minute I closed the door it was darker than pitch. I knew there would be a light somewhere with it's size but I left it off just in case the light might give me away.

I could hear everything that was being said through an air conditioning vent. I knew instantly something would go down.

"Where is Chelsea?" My dad yelled.

"What the hell are you doing?" Vaughn asks, pissed.

"None of your damn business!"

"Where do you think you're going! You can't just walk into someone else's house!"

There were steps that came stomping down the hall. I heard doors crashing open and the closer I thought of him being the more I started shaking. As I saw the shadows blocking out out the thin veil of light in front of the storage closet, I stopped breathing, hoping that would some way help my always observant Dad from noticing this. I heard a sharp crack and then a bang as something hit the door. I jumped back a little in surprise. I heard Selena shriek and then it got eerily quiet of than footsteps stomping away and a dragging sound.

"Don't you dare come back here you asshole!" Vaughn yelled, and then a door slam.

I waited a little more in stifling silence and then light surged into the closet. I looked up at the tall figure with broad shoulder that only one man I knew had and jumped into him.

"Easy." Vaughn said softly as he patted my back.

"Who was that lunatic?" Julia hissed.

"My Dad." I responded.

* * *

**Alright. So, I don't really have anything to say on the account that my brain has turned to goo due to heat, but my schedule has filed down to a normal amount of chaos so I'm currently not suffering from lack of sleep problems or stress. Just felt you might want to know. Anyway onto the thanks!  
**

**Mryhh- I just'd like to say how glad I am that you review every chapter. No seriously. It really gives me something to look forward to on a week to week basis. So thanks. Anyway, if my memory serves me right, ADHD stands for attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, which is a fancy medical way of saying I have major issues of just staying still long periods of time and paying attention to just one thing. Which, kind of shows itself in my writing style if you know what to look for. As for the chapter lengths, sorry they've been short. I don't really plan things out when I start writing so it's not like I planned for them to be short, they just worked out that way. But I can promise longer chapters on the way. Oh and you kind of snuck that last suggestion in there, barely noticed it. Nicely done. But yeah, I'll try working on better developing the characters because to be quite honest, they are a bit dull other than Chelsea(in my opinion). Another reason I wanted to end the story and give it a sequel was to give myself a lot more time to go back and review my own work. So the next one will take a lot more time, will probably be better laid out, and will also probably only have monthly updates. When I'd start updating and really undecided other than it'll be definitely after Try's done(obviously, since it's a sequel)and probably when I'm about half way through it to give myself a good head it definitely would be far after this story and maybe next year.(sorry,sorry,sorry, I'm a slow writer...sort of)**

**Okay, thanks for all my silent readers, I'd love to hear from you but I understand if I don't. I don't really have anything else to say so, bye!**


	17. It's okay

**A/I've been very jumpy in my stories later so I apologize. Also, I have to do two incredibly important projects that'll take up a lot of my time plus I've been completely drained lately and by the time my projects are done my family will go on a vacation, then after that I'll be off to camp for a couple of weeks. So I'll be on a short hiatus for a while after this.  
**

* * *

**Vaughn**

A bunch of screaming woke me up forcing me to peel open my eyes and, with a start, realized that for once, I was late for work.

I swore. Quickly I got dressed and walked out of my room only to be pushed back by Chelsea running down the hall. I looked down at her and was shocked. It didn't seem possible for anyone to be as pale as Chelsea was at that point. Her eyes were as wide as they could possibly go showing a thin line of white around the iris which briefly made me think that her eyes might fall out.

"The hell?" I said confused.

She brought a shaking finger up to her lips to signal me to essentially shut up and not say anything about her just before she groped at the storage closet door, found the handle and slipped in. I stared out at the closed door and willed it to open to show that wasn't just a very weird dream. A loud banging on Mirabelle's front door shook that thought away. Julie went to open the door and revealed our guests.

At the door stood Toby, a man well known for his Fishing and Exploration company, a rich man. Right now an angry looking rich man. With his silvery blue hair and heavy lidded green eyes he was unmistakable. Behind him stood a woman with her arms folded, tight clothes on, a long ponytail that ends in a curl and a look of irritation plastered on her face. Next to her was scared looking Mark and behind him stood a sheepish teenage looking girl. She had long auburn hair with green eyes and she reminded me a lot of Chelsea in some way.

Julie looked at me unsure as I stood at the door frame from the room hallway. I stepped forward.

"Can we help you?" I ask.

"Where is Chelsea?"

Suddenly remembering Chelsea's frightened face I felt protective. "s'cuse me?"

"Where is Chelsea?!" He yelled trying to shoulder his way in.

"What do you think you're doing!?" I shouted.

He barged in and raced through the hallway I'd just came from.

"That's none of your damn business!" He yelled out at me..

At each door he saw he gave the knob a vicious turn and slammed the door open. If he tore any holes in the wall he better believe I'll send him the damn bill. When he got closer to the closet I started getting agitated. " Where do you think you're going? You can't just walk into someone else's house!"

He turned to me and dropped his voice. "Listen, I'll pay you however much you want, just get me Chelsea. Now."

I stared at him shocked then practically growled. Somehow the mentioning of money made me feel insulted, and without much thought I punched him into the storage door. He stared off, dazed.

I looked over at the woman and she screamed. With that, I picked up Toby by his collar and dragged him down the hallway. I threw him out of the house and the woman and the teen quickly followed him out. "Don't you dare come back here asshole!" I shouted at them, then I slammed the door hard enough to rock the frame. I breathed slowly trying to calm down, then I remembered. Chelsea's in the storage closet. I almost rushed down the hall and opened the closet, she jumped a little and looked at me. Before I could say or do anything she jumped into my chest shaking.

"Easy." I said rubbing her back. Slowly she started to calm down.

"Who was that man?" Julia said scornfully.

"My dad."

I stared shocked at Chelsea.

"You're dad is Toby Tao? You're a Tao?" I asked Chelsea.

She pulled away a bit, just enough to step out my arms and looked at me with almost a defiant look. "Yeah."

Suddenly Julie snapped to attention. "Toby Tao? That man? Chelsea you should have told us he was your dad he could of helped a lot with the island!"

Chelsea shook her head slowly and with a familiar sinking feeling I felt we were stepping in risky territory.

"Julie it's not like we needed help, we handle ourselves fine."

Julie stared at me in disbelief. "We could be living in better, warmer houses and you think we couldn't use that kind of help? I'm sure if heard about how his daughter was living he'd jump to help the island."

"Bull shit." Chelsea hissed, her arms wrapped around herself, as if trying to warm up.

"What?" Julie asked.

"My dad hasn't helped me a single damn time in the last 8 years. He's barely looked at me in the last 4 either."

"But he came in here all worried."

"Worried?" Chelsea laughed a dry laugh. "No. I heard him. He was just pissed. There was no damn worry in his stupid voice."

Julie stared shocked. I'd already heard about a lot of this from Mark and his actions didn't help his case either. But how bitter Chelsea sounded? It felt like my heart collapsed.

"I should have seen this coming too." Chelsea suddenly sounded very tired as she spoke that line. Like it was something she's had to say before. I placed my hand on her shoulder, she trembled slightly then slapped it off running down the hall.

I chased after her and just caught a sight of her easily clearing the kitchen window and running into the woods. Suddenly that sinking in my stomach grew worse and I knew I would probably have to follow her. I turned to Julie. "Try to get everyone on the island to the beach." Then I took off the same way as Chelsea following an unusually clumsy made trail for her. I kept rushing after the trail slowly feeling it slope. After going over a very shallow part of the river and up a slightly treacherous slope I caught sight of Chelsea climbing up the mountain trails. I quickly raced after her and caught up with her at the top. She turned around startled at my slight pants.

"How do you ever go so fast and not even lose your breath."

She gave a small smile and just shrugged. "I've never had anyone catch up to me other than my dogs."

I snorted. "So basically when you want to get lost, you get lost."

She grinned a bit bitterly. "I guess to others miss fortune, that's true"

I sat on a rock inviting her to continue. She sneered, "Okay how much did the snitch tell you?"

I gave a small smirk a this. "Mark only told me what the family thinks."

She sighed. "Right."

She came over and sat right next to me. "You know you won't believe me right?"

I chuckled a little. "I saw a living teddy bear, enchanted animals and floating bottles around you. I'd believe you if you said you were cursed."

"It's kind of long."

"I'm here until you tell me to go away."

She leaned against me. "That might be nice."

* * *

**Really lazy so gonna skip right to the thanks.  
**

**Mryhh- ADHD isn't really a disease considering a disease is something that affects your health. It's more like a condition which affects your lifestyle, and it's also something that some people never realize they have so it's really nothing that's a big deal.(well for me at least considering I have it mildly) I have it so you wouldn't immediately think, oh she has ADHD but at the same time if I told you I had you would go 'that makes sense. They're also a few other symptoms of ADHD but since most people aren't usually aware of them I decided to just leave them out. Oh and I'm sorry to say that I've never played "Fire emblem: The sacred stones" but it rings a note so I think I've at least heard of it. Glad you like their sense of humor, I'll try sneaking in happy times so they joke around a little more. Also, I'm sorry for the hecticness, I didn't really know how to transition to Chelsea's dad arriving but now that I think about, I didn't have to make her jump so much...oh well what's been done is done. Also, yeah I'm a girl. :) **

**Fairy-San -Glad to see you're still reading. **

**Again, thank you to all my silent readers! I hope I can hear from you though...no pressure.**

**Okay, if you didn't read the top I'm going on, what I hope to be, a short hiatus. At the least,it'll be a month, at it's most it might be 3 or 4 months. I'm sorry for this but the start of summer time has always been hectic for me so there's nothing really I can do about it. I'll try making the break as short as possible but no promises. **


	18. broken homes

**A/n **

**5,121 word count for this story not counting the authors notes. Long enough? Anyway sorry its been a while, at first I was busy then summer laziness kicked in. I promise highly irregular updates at this point. Because to be honest, I'm finding it hard to be motivated to do anything other then Skyrim right now. Which for three days I can't be on because of a promise not well thought out to my brother...oh well. If there's something wrong please just remember, it's 5:36, and I just had to use a calculator to figure out what 22-12 was, then temporarily forgot how to use a calculator. I'm tired. Oh yeah. may be tears ahead. Anyway enjoy chapter 18 of 'Try'!  
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* * *

**Chelsea **

'He's warm' I thought. I tried remembering the last time I'd ever intentionally made contact with another human but my brain failed me. Despite that, leaning on Vaughn still felt oddly comfortable.

"Are you sure you want to hear it?" I asked, still unsure.

"Positive." He confirmed.

"And you'll believe me? You'll believe I'm not making anything up?"

"If you say it's true, then it's true." If anyone else had said that I would've never believed them. But this was Vaughn, so I nodded my head and talked.

"My mom loved me through anything. I've screwed so much shit up that if she hated me it would be justified. Yet every single time I'd screw up and come to her admitting I'd done something stupid again she'd just smile at me and say, 'You'll gain from your mistakes if you can just admit them.'"I smiled ,sadly. "Whether that's true or not I'm still waiting to find out though."

I took a deep breath. "There was this time where my mom was training a tiger that was born in captivity. It had a history of violence towards its keepers and if nothing was done there were plans to euthanize it for safety sake. But due to the tigers increasing endangerment they didn't want to do that if they didn't have to so they sent him to my mom. Anyway, when they brought it in that day I was in the area feeding the wild cats with my Aunt."

"When I saw the tiger I wanted to get a closer look. I wound up accidentally letting it out of the cage. There was an uproar and a tiger hunt went out making my mom have to find him first before anyone my mom found him, but long story straight we had security cameras everywhere that told my mom exactly who was responsible. She took the fall for herself, said she'd been careless and didn't lock the gate firmly. Not that I didn't get in trouble though, I was banned from the big cat area for a year." I laughed at my past stupidities.

"When that year was up my mom brought me over to the enclosure of that same tiger and told me that they were so satisfied with how my mom had handled him that his welfare was solely in her care. But when she brought me to him she told me that she hoped I'd learned from the past and said he's in my hands now."

I shook my head. "I'm sure she was triple checking everything I did with him but I was still blown away by it. I fell in love with that tiger and named him Asmara. He's stayed at the sanctuary since then and has sired a few cubs. He should still be there too if my dad has followed my mom's will." I frowned then shook my head.

"Anyway that's just one of the things she'd always do and it wasn't just for me either. She was like that with almost everyone. Especially so if they showed any form of interest in animals. On the last day she was alive she'd organized a wildlife learning hike for a small group of people interested. It was on that hike where a lot went wrong fast."Everything shook for me as memories came rushing in. Vaughn noticed and wrapped one of his arms around me. I snuggled closer.

" When we were on this hike I'd heard what I thought was a fox kit calling. I had been traveling at the back of our group and was actually quite a distance behind. The fox's call sounded really weak so I worried about losing it if I got my mom. So I went after it myself. After a while I came to a stop at a drop into the river, I couldn't hear the fox so I tried getting closer. The ground underneath me crumbled. I didn't freakin slip if that's what Mark told you." I glared slightly at Vaughn and he laughed a little.

"I figured it be weird for you to slip seeing how you managed yourself chasing after a dog in the forest."

I nodded my head a little happy that he's believing me so far. Well, I haven't really gotten quite to the unbelievable part yet though.

"The river was fast-moving and I wasn't really a strong swimmer. I resisted but I still got swept away. I was smashed against rocks and eventually gave up and went limp, passing out. Eventually I saw a white flash and was completely comfortable, though I felt a strange loneliness. However what's been seared in my mind was the pain I had when I was pulled out of the white light." I looked at Vaughn. He had a very complex expression that I couldn't really decipher but he was still listening which was encouraging so I went on.

"I was vaguely aware, however of that pain slowly fading away and had a strange sense of floating." I licked my lips and sped up the speed I was talking a little. "I opened up my eyes, and saw I was in fact floating off the ground. In fact, I was rising, with the cliff getting closer. When I got to the top my mom was there smiling with tears running down her face." I stopped to think. "It's weird how sharp details can get in your mind when something completely unexpected happens. I remember landing very softly on the ground and my mom rushed over and hugged me. I still had a feeling of my pain slowly disappearing and I looked over at my mom." I gulped. "Slowly, blood was soaking my mom's shirt. I remember thinking that it looked like a flower from hell."

"Any fog that was clouding my mind before cleared when I saw my mom bleeding. I shot up with a sharp pain and looked at her. She still had that smile on her face and she still had tears in her eyes. I started crying and saying things that I can't really remember and then she started saying something else as well. Whatever it was I forgot because when she finished saying it she closed her eyes and started getting colder. I can remember that my pain had stopped going away and was now just sitting there reminding me of cold water and suffering." I sniffed because at some point during the story I had started crying. "I can't remember how long I sat there screaming at my mom to get up before my dad and everyone else found us with my mom's two best dogs Duena and Deuce. I can't really remember much after that, just that everything else after just felt like hell."

"I couldn't really speak to anyone, but when I could speak, I was speaking to a stern looking officer. He told me to tell him everything, and when I did, he sneered. So I never said it again. In fact, I never said anything for 3 months. First they thought it was just acute stress reaction, then they said acute stress disorder, then I was diagnosed with an extreme case of Post traumatic stress disorder. People I thought I could trust screamed at me, gossiped about how it was my fault and I was acting victim. My dad would cry every time he saw me and curse me when he thought I wasn't anywhere around and my brothers never missed a chance to ask me why I didn't stay with the group. I went to a therapist for a short time after two months of silence. I finally broke my silence when she pissed me off somehow and I threw a glass vase at her. Immediately, they stopped taking me to psychiatrists and started doping me with meds. They talked about how I was so much better. More active." I snorted.

"I was high on prescription drugs, too high a dose for people my age in the first place! They're lucky I didn't develop any dependency or addiction symptoms from it! When I somehow got used to one of the prescription drugs that controlled my anger, it flared up and I flushed every last pill down the toilet, punched out my aunt for trying to stop me and went for a stroll out on the street."

"When I came home that day I barged into my dad's office shouted 'no more drugs you stupid prick!' then left for my room. After an hour he came in and I pretended to sleep, he just stood there for a bit flipped off the light then left."

At some point Vaughn had started stroking my hair. I don't think he was even thinking about it either. It felt nice.

"At some point in all that my dad remarried to a woman I hated and got rid of everything related to my mom. When she was around me I just would feel this insane amount of anger and would do something stupid. My dad always responded in some way so I kept it up too. Then he started getting used to it and would just ignore me completely." I looked at Vaughn.

"Do you know how much it sucks to be treated like you're not there?"

He looked at me with sad eyes. "Yeah. I do."

"Really? Why, how?" I asked him.

"I'll tell you later." He sounded so lonely that it broke my heart. Unfortunately the only thing I knew what to do was continue.

"So, me being a pissed off teenager with mental issues I went to the streets a lot. I'm proud to say I've never touched a drug or alcohol but I did get into gang fights I didn't belong in."

Vaughn nodded his head. "That explains a lot."

I laughed a little and it seemed to help take the pressure off. "I know right?"

"Anyway, I would come home with blood on me. Sometimes my own, other times it was others. Each time Selena would throw huge fits, which kind of amused me in a twisted way. Everyone who used to be close to me would always keep their distance, and somehow, I was satisfied with that. I felt they all were traitors. They couldn't be trusted. That no one should be trusted. You know, now that I think of it, most of them didn't really deserve it. They were just trying to get past mourning." I shook my head.

"It went on for some time like that. I can't really remember how long, I just remember that whenever I was near anything that reminded me of family it always seemed to have a dark feel to it. Like it was an evil entity that should be avoided. That is, and don't you dare tell the douche this, he'll have a field day with this, until Mark grabbed me by my shirt and yelled in my face 'Why is everyone acting like a victim!'." I smiled.

"The kid probably completely forgot about it. But I didn't. It gave me a confused feeling. Here were people I knew well who wouldn't dare talk to me and then there's Mark screaming in my face. Mark and I barely talked when my mom was alive. In fact, I usually found him annoying. So him confronting me? Surprised is a joke to what I was. So I did what I had done to deal with things. I went out. I felt hollow. In fact, it was probably a step up from the feeling of non-existence I had before. I was just walking, feeling like a ghost, no real plans to do anything. But on that walk, I passed an alley and heard this heart wrenching whine that I couldn't ignore. I mean before that day, I probably wouldn't even had heard it. But that's not the point, the point was I did. I thought about leaving it alone and going away. I mean, the last time I did something about an animal in distress, someone died. But I was still my mother's child. I was raised to never ignore an animal. Add that to the fact that something in me felt like this was my last chance to save myself, I couldn't ignore it. I searched for it. I crawled under a dumpster, moved around cardboard, even went in the dumpster to look for it. I found what I was looking for under a huge pile of wood. It was a really small opening, just between the wall and the wood, and I didn't think anything could hide there. Yet, despite that, one of the most malnourished puppies I have ever seen was cowering there too dirty for me to even tell what breed he was."

"Without a second thought I reached for him and with what little strength he could he raised his head, sniffed me, then licked my hand. I felt for him. He was reaching for his last hope as well. I pulled him close and held onto to him like my life depended on it. I ran to a pet store and bought like, ten things of wet dog food and fed it to him just outside the store. When he finished that off I raced to a place I hadn't been to since my mom's death. The Leena animal Sanctuary and rescue, same place my mom had run and founded. I found Neil, one of the around the clock animal vet's at the time and gave Gabe to him. He examined him and told me that Gabe had a really low chance of survival. I burst into tears feeling like I'd failed this puppy. Like I've failed everything I started babbling things and I told him that if there's anything that might help to please do it. He patted me on the head and told me not to worry.

I came every single day. Sometimes twice a day. Each time the little fighter looked better than the last and with each day I felt a little more hope return. One day Neil came to me with this massive smile and said he was fine and that I could take him home. I can't accurately describe how good it felt to hear that. It kind of felt like all the despair that had built up exploded into fireworks and left nothing but warmth and light. I felt..." I scrambled for words. "Like, I'd been saved. It...made me want to help."

"Help?" Vaughn asked.

I nodded. "I didn't know who, it was just, suddenly, I wanted to be that difference that saved somebody." I looked up at the clouds."I probably felt I owed it to them."

"I started with Mark's family. I don't know what I was really expecting but it definitely wasn't what I got. This skinny little girl came to the door. She was about 7 or 8 at the time. She looked up at me and smiled massively and asked me if I was that girl everyone was trying to get." I looked at Vaughn who was obviously confused.

"That scared the ever living shit out of me I swear to you. I mean, gang fights, hello. So of course my intelligent reply was 'what?' So she went on saying that 'Mommy' had been planning on taking me away from the wicked wizard who had cast evil darkness charms on the world. She also said that other bad people were trying to steal me into the darkness and make me a denizen of evil and that if no one did anything then I might accidentally cast a dark shroud of darkness on people and it will kill everyone. Then she went on with eyes that, I swear to you Vaughn, sparkled, her eyes were most definitely sparkling, that I was like a Princess who goes against the evil queen and her wicked wizard." I paused because Vaughn was hunched over with his shoulders shaking.

"See you're doing a better job of holding back laughter than I did. I fell onto the steps of the door because I couldn't stand anymore I was laughing so hard. I felt horrible! This poor girl was being completely serious about it too! So of course I made the story worse."

"How on hell did you accomplish that?" Vaughn joked.

"I told her that the wicked wizard cast a spell where I laughed at the truth. This poor girl, she ran into the house and came out with the most gaudy, sparkliest pink wand I have EVER seen waved it over me and said 'ALAKAZAM Now you're okay' I had to bite my lip bloody not to laugh more. My ribs ached. Then Mark saw us and he was PISSED."

"Why's that?" Vaughn asked smirking.

"Turns out the girl was his younger sister Kalpana, he calls her Kal, I somehow started calling her Panini, and that he's been trying to get his mom to stop telling her fairytales so she'd stopped getting bullied at school for believing in magic. She was so upset about it that she'd barely eat. Vaughn I was expecting to do house chores or pay for house damages or things like that. You know what I did instead?"

I stood up. "I actually tapped into my inheritance from my mom to buy this big poofy dress and a gold tiara. Then I paid a makeup artist to make me look like a princess and small time actors to play the evil wizard and the queen. Then, I rode a public bus, could've taken one of the cars but NOO I take a bus, to a horse and carriage company, pay THEM to drive me to her school at recess time, and I perform this huge performance that almost made even the teachers believe Panini's stories. Needless to say she went from being bullied to being class hero. But of course I screw myself over and tell everyone that I owned the carriage and horses and told them they could come over whenever. So I wind up buying them."

"Chelsea, that's a lot of money."

"You're telling me! I bought them! It was actually my money my mom had left to me! Not even my dads! So on the way home I'm spotted by some of the people I had been hanging out with. They nearly died from laughing, I nearly died of embarrassment. Needless to say, I've never seen them again which is probably a blessing. Also turns out that the two horses I had bought were a year from 'retirement' which never implies a good thing for a city horse. So, although I still can't stand the sight of pink I don't regret it. But next thing I know I'm being followed around by a 8 year old who thinks of me as the kind helpful princess and I'm constantly being called by people who wanted to give me their retired animals or hand off a stray to me. I'm not going to refuse them. In the first place, if I can't handle them I know of a place that does and if I did refuse them I'd be crushing Panini's opinion of me. So almost like a glove, I slipt into my mom's role. I knew everyone my mom knew, I knew almost everything she knew, and I had the same resources she had. It was great! Everyone was going to normal, or at least I thought they was.

My dad found out, I thought hey, cool, maybe he'll cheer up! He didn't, he broke. He ripped apart the barn I'd been hosting the animals in. When I went up to him about it, he told me he built it,his money went into it, he could destroy it. If I had a problem with that then I could deal with it myself."

I turned to Vaughn. "I took that as a challenge."

"I didn't want to spend money on contractors so I hung around some repair shops and construction sites. If I heard something was being built, I went to watch. When I felt confident I could imitate what they were doing, I researched it and what to do and what never to do. Then I bought a bunch of building materials and started from the foundation up. I was working alone so I was working for 4 solid months and had just barely finished putting up the framework. On one particularly hot day day, I slipped from the ladder and woke up in a hospital. Wasn't too serious, just a mild heat stroke and a sprained ankle. But I threw a fit. I had to finish the barn."

"Why didn't you pay someone to build it for you?" Vaughn asked.

"Because I didn't and still don't like the idea of using the money my mom has left behind."

Vaughn nodded.

"They had planned on keeping me there for a week. I bite my cheek and walked out on both feet and no crutches the second day. Everyone panicked. It was kind of funny, the one who found me first was Mark. He thought I was retarded or something because I was shaking on the same ladder I fell off of trying to build the roof. He asked me why and the lame explanation I came up with was 'cause princess aren't known to stay down for long'. He snickered at me but the next day he was there first with a set of crutches and a crew of volunteers to help me finish the barn. With that, what would have taken me the better part of a year and then some was done in two months. I took back all the animals that had temporarily been relocated and I went out.

I made calls, I looked in nooks and crannies, I checked deserted houses and neighborhoods. Any place or area that had an animal that could use my help, I went out and I found them. Eventually pounds that euthanized dogs and cats sent them to me, full shelters would keep animals with me while they were up for adoption, people who couldn't handle their animals would have me take care of them, when police or animal lovers found strays or unusual animals they called me first and animal control later, pretty much anyone who needed an animal to be sheltered sent them to me. I never ever turned them away, no matter what."

"I know you told me you worked, but where did you find all the room and resources for that?" Vaughn asked.

I gave a smile. "I didn't just work, I also searched. Not just for animals, but for people who could use a friend. People who might need a little help. I was good at it too! I could put just the right person with just the right animal and the two would be inseparable from what I heard and saw. I gave them to a range of people. From friends and family, to people I might just come across on the streets. I also trained working animals and gave them away for free to people who could care for them. I gave a lot of animals to small time farmers. You'd be surprised how many people were willing to help me out here and there. I got random donations as well. Some huge from well off people, some just change from kids who heard about me in school."

Speaking of which, I got a letter one time from this young boy. Back then he was 10. He kept going off on how I was amazing, how he wants to do what I do when he grows up, how I was his role model. I'd only been doing this for a year or two. To hear that kids were making me role models, it felt, odd, not right at all. I sent a letter back to him, about everything I'd done in my life, start to finish, in as simplified as I could get it. Apparently, he showed his parents the letter. They came over to my barn one day and personally handed me a check for 15,000 dollars. They told me how they went door to their neighborhood reading everyone my letter, about how they held this huge banquet at their school."

They asked if they could see the animals. I wasn't going to say no. They wound up taking home a cat they named Whiskers and a super hyper and overly curious mutt they called Frisk. Before they left I asked them what the school was called and then two weeks later I arranged a day where I came with one of every kind of animal I had. I brought Gabe as well. I told them their stories. I told them my story. There were tears, but the kids loved it. There was a minor rush to pet and play with the animals. It was actually one of the coolest things I've ever done."

"Eventually, it wound up being a common thing and I would go around everywhere I was asked, I never asked for a money because I never needed it. That was until my dad jumped in again. Because I was still a minor at the time, only being 16 legally he still controlled my life. He told me that if I continued to talk to organizations and groups, he'd make it so they'd have a very hard time staying afloat in business. He's one of the most influential people in business. When he says something like that, he means it. So I quit going to them."

"I immersed myself in my work and prepared to deal with money shortage just in case. I grew insanely accustomed to sleeping very short periods of time often throughout a day so sleeping for long periods feel unnatural. I grew the food the animals ate, I personally took care of the animals and I personally found the better off homes. All at the same time I had Neil teach me everything I had to know about any animals health. Since he had his own job to handle he wasn't around to help with the animals but when I had concerns all I had to do was call him and he walked me through it. Eventually, I just became this person that everyone knew. So instead of me going to them, they came to me.

"That's when the problems started happening. I was making the animals food, I was making sure they were all well maintained and healthy, I was searching for their future homes, I was doing maintenance upkeep and I was teaching anyone who wanted to be taught. Essentially, I was working myself too hard. One day just as I started to feel faint and like I would throw up my oldest brother, Maven stopped in."

"How many siblings do you have?" Vaughn interrupted.

"1 younger sister and 3 older brothers."

Vaughn nodded so I went on. " He took whatever was in my hands and full throttle yelled at me. He kept screaming about something I couldn't hear or couldn't understand, not sure which really. Something stupid must have made an imprint on me at the time though cause I remember swinging at him. I'm sure I would have forgotten about that too, had I not missed."

"Missing him made you remember it?" Vaughn asked amused.

"Of course it did. In a street fight if you missed you were leaving yourself wide open for an attack you may never recover from. Because of that, when I missed I remembered. I fell with my punch. He caught me, picked me up, dumped me in a pile of hay, and told me 'to sit your ass there until I tell you otherwise!'. He brought me water. A lot of it. I threw it up the first time. Drank it too fast apparently. But the second time around felt like heaven. From there I don't remember anything past that, just that I was in a haypile, then woke up in my bed. I go straight to the barn and there's around twenty people asking to volunteer. I was blown away. I was convinced Maven had something to do with it but you can't get him to confess to anything. But he dropped a hint one time. He said 'even if I did bring people to help, it's your hard work that convinced them it was worth it.'"

I give a small smile. "That's just how it went for a year or two. But then my dad shut me down. He sent over some government people, they said since I didn't have a permit to hold all the animals I had, I couldn't keep them. I had five days to find them all homes before they took them. I tried getting a permit but I never could, no matter what. That's actually how I figured out it was my dad who was behind it. One of the people in charge told me I was more than qualified for one, but someone too high to oppose forbid the company."

" I won't lie, I cried for a while. I'd been through so much for everything and then it was ripped away from me. I kept repeating it in my head till eventually it just PISSED ME OFF. My dad had his door locked and I broke it fireman style. Two years of therapy and they never got out as much from me as I threw at my dad that day. Then I ran away with Gabe. The staleness of it all got to me. 23 years and I had never sat so idle as I did on my own. I couldn't get a job in my state. Couldn't leave the state. I was sitting around waiting for something to happen, someone to bother me, something. Eventually I figured, a scandal would probably easily get me out of it all. So as has been said, I striped a man naked. Cruel, but necessary. One lawsuit later and I was being shipped off to a privately owned island. One shipwreck later and I'm here. Facing off with my dad and his wife again. I'm glad to see him well but at the same time seeing him just pisses me off so much. And, Vaughn? "

Vaughn looked at me.

"Vaughn I'm happy, I don't want to leave my home again."

Vaughn came up and hugged me.

"I don't want to go." I cried

He nodded his head. "He can't make you."

Somehow despite all odds I felt truth and comfort in his words.

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**A/n **

**I get back and all of a sudden I have to bully the two characters... It's okay, happiness awaits you!...Eventually.**

**Okay, I'm sorry if the comments sound a little short and turt. Like I said, REEAALLYY tired.**

**Sabreth- ouch and ouch. Can't say I didn't have it coming though. You're right about the author's notes if it was me I would have dropped the story. So I'm glad you stuck with it. Is this chapter long enough X3? **

**Mryhh- Nah you're fine. It takes a lot for me to think someone rude. And thanks! My vacation was awesome, and little too much car for my tastes but I enjoyed it none the less. And the projects...if you learn anything from me it's not to shove things off as long as possible...one was mostly class work so it was mostly fine the other was half finished...good thing I had a high grade in that class just finished it off the average with a B+. **

**Terezi- OH MY GOSH A WILD TEREZI HAS APPEARED! (I'm sorry there just some things self restraint can't control) Glad to find a fellow Homestuck fan in a Harvest Moon fan base. X33**

**I hope you guys enjoyed this! If not sorry! Again sorry for the long wait, what was it? Like...3 months? My bad. If you have any complaints feel free to voice them. Thank you all my silent readers and now if you excuse me I think I might just go pass ou- I mean go to bed.**


	19. To the beach

**A/n Two things. One Mark is not smart. Second sorry for the short chapter.**

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**Mark**

All day I felt as if I've been walking on tiptoes trying to avoid shards of glass. And failing pretty badly at it as well. It's a sandwich of terror walking between Uncle Toby and Selena. Not just that but a guilt trip as well as they force me to take them everywhere Chelsea could be hiding from them.

I'm pretty positive Chelsea was at Mirabelle's and I've never been more appreciative of Vaughn's temper before because of it. If Chelsea had been found it would have been game over and then they'd take her back kicking and screaming. For now, the longer Chelsea stays out of these two ways the better for her. At least until someone can figure something out. Of course, I've been taking them to places almost guaranteed for Chelsea to avoid after Mirabelle's . I'd still be doing that if it wasn't for Uncle Toby figuring it out.

Of course there's still one place Chelsea avoids that Uncle Toby has never noticed before.

Chelsea hates the beach.

**Chelsea**

"Absolutely not."

"Why not?" Vaughn asks.

I fidgeted around trying to come up with an answer. "Because- Because  
I said so that's why!"

"But Chelsea everyone should be there. It's probably the safest place on the island right now." Vaughn says holding lightly to his hat against the wind.

"No the safest place on the island would be in a small hole. About 500 feet in the ground."

Vaughn sighed, "How is that a small hole."

"Uh...maybe if it was only two feet acros- WAIT! That doesn't matter. Actually maybe it does…I think I'm going to go hide in the mine! Yep, that seems like a great idea!"

I tried runing away but was stopped by Vaughn. "That's a dumb idea and you and I both know that. Why do you not want to go to the beach anyway? It's not like you've particularly avoided it until now."

"Well now I have a reason!" I yell, "Dad loves the beach. Even if he wasn't looking for me, I'd probably still run into him."

Vaughn sighs again. "Chelsea, do you trust me?"

I drew back at that. True, I trust him. I'm just not sure if I can trust everyone else as much. Especially as far as my dad is concerned.

Vaughn let the silence sit for about a minute before he spoke. "Chelsea, if you go away, so does the island. No one here will ever try to betray you. Besides, nobody would want to. You make things worth it. You draw people together. You can trust more than just me. Now I'm going to the beach. It'd be a good idea for you to come too."

I watched Vaughn leave down the mountain path. When I couldn't see him anymore, I listened for him. When I couldn't hear him, I started running.

Right down the path he took.

When I saw him I couldn't help but to grab him back.

He turned around and looked at me.

"You told me to come too. I don't think I'd be able to do it alone though."

He smirked. "Stop shaking. I've already told you he can't make you leave."

I smiled "Shut up and walk."

I followed Vaughn down the mountain and whether my dad is there or not, I'm sure I'd be able to face him with everyone.

Maybe.

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**Dear readers, sorry short chapter is short. But you have no idea how much writers block is screwing with me right now. Especially considering I know what I want to happen, I just don't know how to get there. So sorry for any frustration.**

**Guest- I'm glad you liked it! **

**Dolphinz411- First, of course, Homestuck is awesome. Second, Thank you. Third, I don't really know. I guess I'm kind of going more towards Dave and Karkat fanfic right now, so I guess that.**

**Mryhh- Thank you! Be sure to get your sleep though! :)**

**Hope you enjoyed. Leave a review if there's some suggestions you might have. They'd be really appreciated right about now. **


	20. Toby

**A/n Hehe... You guys have no idea how long I've actually been tempted to put this up but I wasn't too sure about how Toby would go over so I was waiting for someone to ask. Glad they have. I might send out a few more chapter like these in Toby's pov, by might it's probably highly likely. Any way this chapter is kind of a look back scene. Hope you enjoy!**

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I looked into her room. Her breath went from erratic to calm in seconds. Years of carrying her sleeping form to her bed will never allow me to believe her when she's fake sleeping.

I sighed. She doesn't trust me anymore. I suppose I can't blame her. From what I've heard she's convinced herself in the back of her mind I hate her. Blame her for her mothers death even. She never would have thrown that vase if the psychiatrist hadn't been trying so vehemently to get her to talk about her views on me. By now she'll probably be far too afraid of knowing the truth to confront me on it. Oh, but on things she's angry about.

It's almost funny how easily she stormed into my office about her meds. I should have known never to have tried it. Her mother never would have. But it just made her so calm, so easy. I could almost convince myself that she was fine. That everything was fine. That everything wasn't so rapidly going to hell. But it was an illusion. A bittersweet one with consequences far too dire for me to ever try it again. When she stormed out of the house my heart nearly stopped. I thought, 'this is it, I'll never see her again after this.'

I'm sure she didn't mean to do that. At least, I hope she didn't. I don't want to lose her. Or is it that I don't want to let her go? I don't know. She doesn't know though, she'll never know. The things I try so desperately to hide from her. I know she hears some of it. Our most trusted family blaming her for something she doesn't deserve. Just because she's there and they're weak. It hurts. I can do nothing to stop it or shield her it seems. Such a sense of helplessness unlike anything I've felt.

I wiped my eyes and flipped off the switch. The effect was almost immediate. She relaxed her shoulders and cuddled smaller into her sheets cradling a stuffed tiger her mother got her long before Asmara came to the rescue. Long before she could even remember it was her mother that even bought it for her.

I shut her door and smiled.

Her mother tried so hard to in grain so many qualities into her. Happiness, love, trustworthiness, loyalty, responsibility, independence, kindness, understanding of others big small or furry. Compared to her it seems like the only thing I taught her is how to fish. She used to love it so much. Now she rejects it with all her fiber.

I know she does that intentionally. I see it in her eyes, the plain defiance as if she'll have nothing to do with it or me. She gets worse with each thing of her mothers I turn away. But the sight of it just breaks me. I question it. If I'd ever be able to make it through alone or not like this.

"Dad? Why are you crying?"

I looked down at my youngest boy.

"It's nothing kido, go back to bed."

"Are you lonely?"

He left it there in the air. Right to the point as always.

"Go to bed."

He hesitated then slowly turned and started walking up the stairs.

"Hey dad?"

"Yes?"

"Sometimes I'm lonely too. But I'm okay. Because I have you, Maven,and Zac."

"What about Chelsea?"

He scrunched his eyebrows "Chelsea has me, you and Maven. She'll see that eventually."

I smiled at his misunderstanding. That may not have been what I meant, but that explains more than I asked.

"Night Deen."

"Good night Dad."

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**There might be some confusion so let me put it into words right now, Maven, Zac and Deen are in fact Chelsea's older brothers. The ages are in order as listed. This is just a random thing that probably won't be important but Deen is only a year older than Chelsea, Maven is about 7 or 8 years older and Zac is 5 years older. Just wanted to throw that out there. **

**Mryhh- Hehe, thanks for asking for Toby pov, I've had this written for a couple of weeks but wasn't too sure if I should post it. I think I might have the next few chapters on how Toby dealt with Reena death if that's alright. As for the tired thing, during the summer, it's pretty much always not getting enough sleep that does that. I am extremely guilty of it myself. :) As for what exactly it was Reena did, you'll see that in the sequel. **

**Thank You for reading! I might get more activated in updating now that I have an idea of getting where I want it to go. Again if you have a suggestion or just want to mention something you loved or liked during Try, tell me! I'd love to put some more of the things you like into the story. Oh and sorry for putting a little bit of sad in, all I can do is guarantee a happy ending. **


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